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Back No Barriers Save as PDF
Chapters (48)
  1. Title Page
  2. Copyright Notice
  3. Dedication
  4. FOREWORD
  5. Winter Solstice
  6. THE NO BARRIERS PLEDGE
  7. PROLOGUE
  8. 1
  9. 2
  10. 3
  11. 4
  12. 5
  13. 6
  14. 7
  15. 8
  16. 9
  17. 10
  18. 11
  19. 12
  20. 13
  21. 14
  22. 15
  23. 16
  24. 17
  25. 18
  26. 19
  27. 20
  28. 21
  29. 22
  30. 23
  31. 24
  32. 25
  33. 26
  34. 27
  35. 28
  36. 29
  37. 30
  38. 31
  39. 32
  40. 33
  41. 34
  42. 35
  43. 36
  44. EPILOGUE
  45. GLOSSARY
  46. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  47. ABOUT THE AUTHORS
  48. Newsletter Sign-up

But that was far from the end of the story. Rocky got pushed into an underwater alcove and got stuck there by his PFD. Running out of air, he quickly removed the PFD, but then found himself being swept along by the current still submerged. “I was so oxygen deprived at this point,” he recounted, “that I was about to pass out when my head finally popped out of the water after about ninety seconds under. My friends fished me out after I’d swam about a third of a mile and deposited me on shore. I’d lost my paddle, my PFD, and one of my Teva sandals. I lay on a warm rock like a dead lizard for at least a half an hour, reviving and reliving my experience. I realized it was the closest I’ve ever come to dying.”

Everyone was quiet as they contemplated themselves shoved against that undercut. I knew I didn’t have the wherewithal to think my way out after thirty seconds of near drowning. Thankfully, Rob broke the dead silence.

“Big E,” he said, “as I keep saying, you can hold your breath a lot longer than you think.”

“Hope I never have to learn,” I said softly.

“Yes,” Rocky reminisced in his typical mild-mannered voice. “Good to be able to hold your breath. Where we’re going tomorrow, we may need that skill. We’re heading into the Gran Caûon de San José. It’s about twenty miles through a constricted gorge. It possesses, by far, the largest rapids we’ve seen, but with this unusual water flow, it will have some serious hydraulic features, including haystacks—big standing waves that break on their upstream face, back on themselves; powerful and shifting eddy lines; and of course, phantom whirlpools, some so big they may hold you under for more than a minute. I won’t tell each of you what to do. It’s your choice, but if you kayak, some of you will flip and probably swim, and a swim through this canyon will mean a very long one. The vertical walls make it impossible to get to shore, and there’s so much water coursing through the canyon, the waves crash against the sidewalls and push you back into the middle of the river.”

Rocky’s words were followed by an even longer silence than before. I tried to stretch my neck that screamed back at me. And I thought of Rob with a possible fractured spine. This time, I broke the pause. “Rocky, with that lovely description, I think I’m out!”

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