Walliebloggin': Water, Walking, and Whoa!

Whoa!:

Lets start with Whoa! It could have been wow, or whew, or whaaaa!....(all said with great emotion behind them). This was our reaction when we came home last night and opened the door to an incredible sense of urgency in the form of an odor that I am guessing only dog owners can appreciate, or anyone dealing with uncontrolled urges of diarrhea. Am I making myself clear? Tooga, as seen below recooping, had evidently seen "The Exorcist" at some point in his little life, because what Linda Blair did with vomit in that movie, Tooga did with... well.....I'll say no more.

Mulligan attending to his sick brother.

The velocity and force behind (no pun intended) the previously unmentioned, could only be appreciated by rocket engineers from NASA. Miki (bless her little poop covered heart) spent the next two hours cleaning up while I emptied the trailer of anything with shades of brown on it. Around midnight we rolled into bed and slept with one nostril open, hoping there was nothing left to be added to this experience. This morning, Miki took the brown laden items to the laundry here at the RV park and set us back on track to enjoy the rest of the day. The woman has some serious intestinal fortitude.

The bad news is...is that we might never be able to sell this trailer. The good news is...is that Tooga has turned the corner on his bowel misadventures and his recovery seems solid (pun intended).

Walking:
Each day we concern ourselves with walking or exercising the dogs in some way. One place we found that has worked out, but is a bit of a drive, is the "put in" on the Nanatahala River. There is a trailhead at the staging area for the raft companies where they begin their float trips down the Nany. It is about one mile, one way and is paved. The only problem for me, is that like all trails out here, paved or not, poison ivy seems to grow like grass here. They do a good job of staying on the trail and they are rewarded afterwards with a cool dip in the river.

Here, Miki is leading the dogs across the river at the trailhead.

Adventures, here we come...

The reward!

I mentioned the staging area for the rafting companies above, here are three different areas where rafts are prepared for the days rafters.

There are kids inflating and stacking rafts and inflatable kayaks, known as "duckies," almost as fast as the buses unload the ~~$$$~~ tourists.

The Water:

A significant part of our whitewater clinics we took over the years concerned safety on and in the water. Each raft guide and many private boaters carry a "throw bag" with them which contains a length of rope to be thrown to aid someone in the event that they have fallen out of their boat. The point on the river that this occurs most frequently is the last rapid (a class 3 rapid) known as "the falls." It is a little dicey and most paddle through unscathed. But if you are one of the lucky few, the surprise you find yourself in when it happens to you (like it has to me) is the helplessness you feel from the power of the water...not to mention the temperature will take you breath away to add insult to injury. So, the rafting guides will usually have a guide that has already run the falls, set up with their throw bag just in case the other boats in their group require their assistance. Sometimes there are many people with throw bags at the ready and sometimes there are none. It is fun and challenging to help out as needed and each time we visit the river, I like to spend some time throwing my throw bag. Today I had some extra help.