Day 13- Mom Conquers the Nile

    What an amazing day. It rained last night while we were at NRE and it freshened everything up and made for a relatively crisp morning in Uganda. It was still cloudy so there was no amazing sun rise but the sun did come up, thankfully. The morning started off pretty fast with loading into an overland bus and heading into Jinja to start the day of excitement. 

    Mom ran the river in a topo duo and I was stoked to be there to watch. It was a perfect atmosphere at the put in to the river. Mom was excited, there a loads of safety boaters because the rafts flip a lot, and I was excited just to be paddling the White Nile with my mom! Not many women can say that. Immediately, I knew the guy who was in the topo with Mom was going to be awesome. He was joking around and he was very friendly. He was just excited to have another day on the water. It is a huge bummer to think that in 4 years this whole river will be under water. 

    Mom had a gargantuan smile on her face the whole day and her guide, Peter, was taking her down the meat of every rapid. For her, even though she can whitewater kayak, she was more than stoked to be in the front of a duo for the day, much more low stress. 

    We came up to Itunda, the biggest rapid of the day, I walked it last week when we did the run and I suddenly found myself being guided into the rapid with one of the safety boaters. Its a pretty large rapid with some of the biggest holes I have seen in my life, with a must make line. I felt good going into the rapid, the entrance makes the whole rapid either go perfectly or completely wrong. I had a bit of a small bobble at the top drop but saved it and the rest of the rapid went perfectly. I was stoked to “get that monkey off of my back” and know that I styled it. 

    The rest of the day was great and Moms trip ended with an auto eject from the front of a boat during a relatively out of control surf in Fight Club. She still had her smile glued to her face and she was as happy as a clam. The day, all in all, was the best day that I have had here yet and I am unsure if they will get any better than that. I am so lucky to be able to have this experience with my Mother and share the river with her. She is the best.