Monday, November 5, 2012

The closest I ever came to collapsing in the heat:

Sadan River, Central Sulawesi, Indonesia
We got to an area that the guides were scared of 
because someone had drown there earlier in the season.
So we stopped and carried our dry bags down below the dangerous area, 
then lowered the raft down the rapids with a rope.




 This is a photo of us carrying the dry bags down the river about 100 yards.

The next photo is of us lowering our raft down a very dangerous part of the Sadan River in central Sulawesi, Indonesia. Our guides told us that a rafter had drown in this section and their supervisor told them that they had to lower the raft down this part of the river with a rope. First, we had to portage all of the dry bags past this area so that the raft would be lighter and easier to control with a rope. You can see how hard it was to carry a heavy dry bag as we jumped from boulder to boulder. We are only at about 4 degrees south latitude so we are very close to the equator. A few minutes after this photo was taken I was almost overcome by the heat. The photo doesn't portray just how hot it really was. It was scorching! I used my hat to scoop water out of the river and pour over my head.
Trevor took this photo from the top of a boulder. He was only 10 years old at the time. See how I have the rope. The small Indonesian guides knew that it would take a big guy to slowly lower the raft down the river without getting dragged off of a rock. You can see the churning white water.





Finally we got the raft below the dangerous area.