A thrill called Rafting

The first image that comes to mind when you say the word rafting might be a lazy float down the river in a raft. Add to it the words white water rafting and you might imagine floating down a chilly river. Oh you are in for a surprise! “Lazy” and “Rafting” are words that don’t go together ever! Rafting is a pure thrill, an unparalled adventure that will leave you gasping (literally) for more (water)!

Technically speaking rafting or more popularly known as white water rafting is a recreational activity utiliszing a raft to navigate down a river or other water bodies. This is usually done on white water or different degress of rough water in order to thrill and excite the rafters.

Let us first get the technicalities in place so that we can better understand what rafting is all about and experience the same while you read ahead.

A raft (the quintessential object for rafting) is any flat floating structure for travel over water. It is the most basic of boat design, characterized by the absence of a hull. Primitive rafts were made of wood or reeds. Modern day rafts used for recreational rafting are of the inflatable variety, manufactured of durable, multilayered rubberised fabrics. They comprise of air chambers and function by the physics of floatation.

The term whitewater is derived from the appearance of the water during rafting. When the river’s gradient drops enough to disturb its streamline flow and create turbulence such as form a bubbly or aerated and unstable current, the frothy water appears white and hence, the term whitewater.

This was my second experience in white water rafting, the first being in Dandeli (Karnataka) on the river Kali. This time it was on the river Kundalika. Kundalika is located in the virgin forests below the Mulshi and Bhira Dams about 120 kms from Mumbai. It is accessible from Kolad, Roha or Durshet. The starting point is Shajey Village below the Bhira dam. We had camped overnight at Nature Trails’ resort in Durshet. From here to Shajey village was 40kms. We (I, Varsha, Kavya, Mitesh, Kamaljeet & Mamta) started our ride in a 6 seater auto at 7 on a nice and cool Sunday morning. The ride took us 11/2 hours. On the way we were treated to beautiful sights of cloud covered fields.

During non monsoon, the rafting in Kundalika is dependent upon the water release from the Mulshi and Bhira dams. The water is released at 9am and thus, we were asked to report at 8.30am. This half hour was to be utilised for general briefing and training. Our trainer Shyam arrived in style with his colleague. Life jackets were tightly strapped onto our torsos, helmets donned, paddles held, footwear discarded, sunblock rubbed all over and we were ready to raft!

We were grouped alongwith another family of 3 thus, totalling up to 8 rafters and our trainer Shyam. We were explained about the air chambers, the safety features, precautions, sitting style, paddling motions, what to expect and what not to expect. In the end the bottom line was – to have fun!

When we reached the river bank all we could see was the river bed and rocks.

There was hardly any water to be seen! We waited with bated breath for the waters to be released from the Mulshi and Bhira dams. At 5 minutes to 9 we heard a long siren blow and we were told that when the next siren sounds the water will gush in.

Hardly 10 minutes had passed and we could hear the second siren and the next instant we could hear the gush and roar of water. What a sight to behold.

The entire river bed that we were staring at and the rocks that we were sitting on were all submerged in water in the blink of an eye! The water kept flowing on and on to cover up the complete barren river bed where we were enjoying clicking pictures just a few minutes back.

Once we finished gaping at the flowing water, we couldn’t wait to get into our rafts and onto this rushing, gushing water. We hefted our raft off the river bed and got it onto the water.

We spent a few more precious minutes to put the theoritical training given to us on shore into practice. We paddled forward, back, right back, left front, right front, left back, all back, all front, get down, hold on! It was neat to feel the force of our paddling making us move forward, backward and also round and round.

However the main steering around was being done by Shyam behind our backs (literally).

He sat right at the end of the raft and we occupied the left and right fronts. Since I and the father (from the family who joined us) had done rafting before and knew the basics we were designated the team leaders and put right in front. I took up the right front and he took up the left front. Shyam demonstated the safety tips to us, the rope, the paddle pull, the way to float down in case you are thrown off the raft, how to breathe and swim off when the raft capsizes. Did I just mention swim off? Oh actually out of the 8 of us rafters, only 3 could swim! What then about us? Well, rafting is ideal and absolutely safe for any non swimmer. The life jacket is fool proof and try as you may you will not drown. It brings you back to surface and keeps you bobbing all the time! Finally with all commands and actions in place, we were ready to raft!

It is the most amazing team bulding exercise as you are required at all times to follow your leader during paddling so that you don’t go about having a paddle fight and putting the raft off gear. The 2 team leaders (left and right) are at all times required to maintain eye contact to ensure that the paddling happens in sync.

We started off down river (the stretch was totally 12 kms to be covered in 21/2 hours time due to the restricted water flow from the dams) bobbing up and down lightly on our rafts and enjoying the warm sun on us with the cool breeze on our faces. We looked all around just to encounter barren fields and virgin forest. We did quite a lot of bird watching as we kept on going downriver at a lazy pace to start with. We made eye contact with many kingfishers, cormorants, herons, egrets, and lapwings. If left to us we would never have been able to identify the many birds except the kingfisher. Luckily uncle had good enough knowledge and was able to help us identify the birds. Once on the raft all you will hear is the gurfling musical sound of water flowing down river, the warm breeze, the chirping of the birds and the instructions being shouted by your trainer. 15-20 minutes later we encountered our first rapid.

Shyam screamt out its approach and told us to be prepared to experience the first rapid. It was rather tame but oh we managed to get water splashed onto us when the raft hit the water. Finally we were one with the river and thirsty for more! Letting out a short gasp of breath, we rafted further enjoying the up and down of the water and the mellow and angry churning of the river. For a long time we did not come across any rapid but kept on rafting slowly and steadily drinking in the birds, breeze and sun. The paddling kept us from drifting away into our our world of day dreams. We were kept entertained by Shyam with the tales of the river’s behaviour in monsoon and the many rapids that are formed due to the combination of the dam water and the rainwater. In monsoon you are likely to enjoy 11 rapids! Wow! What we would have given to experience the same. We were able to experience 3 rapids only. On and off we kept hitting turbulent patches and Shyam was smart enough to steer the raft sometimes left and sometimes right so that all of the rafters would be real soaking wet every time the raft hit a rough patch of water.

The next rapid was not very turbulent but really long and bouncy. We went bobbing real up and down for a long long time.

Up and down, left and right, the water kept steering us to suit her whims and fancies. Luckily no one fell off. But yes everyone experienced the scary thrill of no longer being in control and giving in to the mercy of the mighty Kundalika. Shyam suddenly announced the upcoming rapid – Boom Shankar (this is the only rapid name I remember because of the reason that I am about to tell you now). Just when we were about 500 mtrs away from Boom Shankar, we realised why it was called so! Boom – the sound the water kept making because of high water volume and deep gradient and Shankar – for its angry tactics. The moment we hit this gurgling mass of water we were totally out of control having surrendered to Kundalika’s desire to try and upturn us. And was she happy that her wish was granted? Not half a minute had passed when our raft hit this rapid and whoops! Mitesh was in the water. What a sight to behold. He just toppled over and into the water. Thank the life jacket; he was up in a few seconds gasping for air. We all expected Shyam to take control of the raft and steer it so that we could pick up Mitesh, instead to our utter surprise he screamt “keep rowing”! Needless to say we rowed away from Mitesh further ahead, out of the rapid. Mitesh, although being a contestant for the heavy weight championship, got pushed down river. Smart that he was, he had held onto this paddle and Shyam was able to pull him in the moment he came close to our raft. Although he kept gasping for air he said it was a mightly hell of an experience that he is not likely to forget soon considering the fact that he knows no swimming at all! Excitement over we rowed down peacefully downriver with Shyam contemplating the best way to have our raft capsized. He went ahead and gave us the instructions as well but such a team we were we stuck together and didn’t allow him to have our raft capsized although in hindsight, I think we should have let him do it. Once we were out of all the turbulent water we reached what is popularly known as the swimming pool in the Kundalika. From here on the water became calm and peaceful. Shyam urged us all to jump in and enjoy a float downriver. Aunty needed no more encouragement and off she went, splash and swam away from us all to enjoy the water the way a fish does. Uncle followed suit but returned soon after a dip. Then was my turn and I went in too for a real short time. Once back, we had to do a lot of push and shove to get the couple’s son to jump into the water despite the fact that he was a very good swimmer. I guess all he wanted was a real good push from all of us girls. Finally he gave in and was in with a splash too. Next it was the turn of Kavya, Kamaljeet and Varsha and me once again all of who went in one by one, tentatively testing the water and not daring to let go of the lifeline attached to our raft. Mitesh needed no push or tell after his earlier dip and he was in! We enjoyed being floatsam for a stretch of 30-45 minutes after which the water got stagnant due to lack of flowing water and we had no choice but to get back onto our rafts and row it hard to get us ashore.

All the paddling and jostling and bobbing around earlier had left us a little short on energy. We actually counted out the number of rows we would make and then took a breather and then again counted and a breather and so on we reached ashore. To make sure we used up our last reserve of energy Shyam made us carry back the raft uphill.

To top this off we had to make a torturous hike up the hill to reach our auto rickshaw. Our footwear was back there in the rickshaw and we had to walk up the rocky path in the sun to reach the rickshaw. Exhausted and dripping wet we wearily climbed in to the rickshaw to make the 2 hour ride back to our resort. We just couldn’t stop talking about the water on all our way back. Even now when we talk, we end up recollecting and talking about our experience.

We have tentatively planned to go raftng once again in Kundalika during monsoon of 2008 and once in our lifetime we want to raft in the Ganges! Let us have more rafters aboard!