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Published: March 8th 2007
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The Tully river is the fastest White Water Rafting stop on the East coast or so we were told!! WE.... well me!! were keen to give it another go after our experience on the Kaituna river near Rotorua in New Zealand. That time it was good fun but not nearly long enough, by the time you got the hang of it, it was all over. So here we were at the top of the Tully river about to experience a whole days rafting. Two and a half hours in the morning then a BBQ lunch followed by another two and a half hours in the afternoon.
The weather was not great, heavy rain and cloud. But that didn't matter, we were only going to get wet! The Tully has more than 45 rapids and winds its way through world heritage rainforest. Each morning the Tully Dam and Power station at the top of the river releases the water to flood the river below. We were told that on a normal day the force of the water on the river equals about 80 something or other. Killer Joules or something, but anyway, basically today the river was very nearly flooded and
the force was close to 180 whatever it was!! The guides seemed very excited about the fact and it started to rub off. After we suited up and headed down towards the river along a small forest track the sound of crashing water intensified, to the point it gave you a real case a butterflies in the stomach.
You could see the river had swelled quite a bit, the noise of the water and the white froth, it was rampant!! Looking around at peoples faces there were either smells of excitement or faces of fear and intrepidation. I think I was half way between the both, but most definately bricking it!!
The morning session consisted of Tom, the biggest lad I've seen in a while, about 6 foot 5 and 18 odd stone being thrown arse over elbow into the water at every reasonibly tricky bit!! The biggest adrenaline rush came when the raft infornt of us capsized as it went over a small drop into a section of rapids. Everyone went out except for the guide who managed to some how jump in the air as the boat flipped and land on the upturned side!! As for
the rest of his crew they were busy getting swept away down the river!! Within a spilt second of this happening our guide was pre-occupied with trying to rescue the capsized boats crew, meantime leaving our raft to just negotiate the rapids in autopilot.......it was pretty hairy, but in the process of getting thrown about we managed to drag from the water three of the rafts crew. It was a real team bonding moment and a bit of a rush that we all seemed to enjoy, especially, surprisingly enough, the crew of the capsized raft!!
Another prominant moment came when we spotted some "beware of the crocadiles' signs at the edge of the water further down towards the end of our run.......erm!! Nothing to worry about then?? "Oh no!" pipes up our guide Val "there were a couple of spottings last week, but we saw nothing yesterday..." The Tully has crocodiles???
After a BBQ lunch we were off again, the speed and ferocity of the river was noticably less than we had experienced in the morning. However, this didn't stop us from getting the biggest adrenaline shot of the day. In nearly an exact replay of the capsizing
in the morning we headed over a small drop to smack side ways on into a big rock, the near side of our raft shot up in the air, the next thing I saw was Tom on the otherside of the raft directly underneath me before falling head first on top of him and into the water. The raft turned upside down and when I came up for air my head was underneath the raft!! I grabbed hold and moved my head to the outside and came up to see light and a load of arms and legs of everyone else trying to orientate themselves. I was the only one of our crew that managed to stay hold of the raft and once Val had flipped the raft back upright he helped me in.
The days rafting was well worth the long bus ride from Cairns. The experience was made by not only the thrills and spills of the river, but by the scenery which surrounded you. At times it felt like you were rafting down the Amazon with thick jungle spilling out over the river banks and steep waterfall cascades flooding into the river from a high. It
was beautiful.
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