Starting the Journey

While planning, I was supper happy. I couldn’t wait to get on the water, but then the flood waters came.

Whole trees floating down the river, houses being swept away, and people losing their lives. I was anxious in the beginning, thinking that we might not have planned or trained enough. I was scared but I had a gleam of happiness for the quest to come.

Getting down to business and planning is how I started this trip.

So, yeah, I started during a historic flood, and yeah, this quest is dangerous. But, I planned for it and adapted.

Notes from the trip

I was actually really scared but I am proud of myself for not backing out and conquering my fears. I had to remind myself that I have been training for this my whole life. It took a year to prepare for this trip; maps, gear, safety, shuttles. And for two years I Kayaked with the Wave Train Kayaking Team. A big part of my training was also how my mom and dad treated me like a guide in training. I had to learn to swim in the river, repair and flip boats, take CPR and First Aid courses, and though the Yellowstone is 556 miles I did over 80 extra miles of training this season.

When I talk about being adaptable, I didn’t start at the headwaters because of the gnarly danger through the rapids. I started in a super safe section, which allowed me to piece sections of the river together throughout the season as they became safer. My friends that are in the image have never been rafting before, so I chose a section to simply have fun on. I wanted day-one to be amazing not life threatening.

The last thing I want to side note is that, my mom used to be a whitewater rafting guide on the Arkansas river by Buena Vista and Canyon City CO., she was also a fly-fishing guide in Montana. My dad is really good at reading and feeling the waters, and was a former EMT. Being safe and having a daily safety plan was something we talked about every day before we got on the river. I had safety boaters and spotters monitoring the dangerous sections. The point I'm trying to make is that my parents and I took planning this trip really serious. 

If you missed out on part 1 of Vay’s story please check it out here.