A Ride on the Big Foot Rapids

I have been thinking a lot lately about trips I've taken with friends and couldn't help but think about one particular trip. A first trip that was independent of our parents and independent of our church. That year my friends Jennifer, Katie, Karen, and I plotted, planned and finally pulled our parents for a meeting.  We were close in age, only about 17 or 18 and all of us still answering to our parents.

I remember the day we decided to sit our parents down to have a meeting. We had the trip planned, we had asked friends of our who were older, our parents age but with one important distinction, they weren't our parents. They were cool. Jennifer and Katie had much more work cut out for them because they had to convince Katie's parents to let her stay behind since they were just about to move out of state. Somehow, we did it. We planned the trip, we got the okay to go to California where we would hit the beach and visit Knott's Berry Farm.

This was the best time, we were all so excited to visit the park. We hit rides, ate yummy food, and generally had a great time. One particular ride,  however, saw us many many times that day. That was the Big Foot Rapids. This ride was a round float where several people rode face to the center of the float. It was a ride designed to get everyone on each raft drenched in water. If the rapids didn't get you, then surely one of the waterfalls the raft was sure to go under would. It held true for all of us, except one, Jennifer.

We went on that ride several times throughout the day with a goal of getting Jennifer wet and each time someone would come out drenched in water but just not Jennifer. The ride attempts mounted quickly, 5, 6, 7 and still Jennifer maybe a drop or two of water. The 8th, 9th, and 10th tries were met with a little more determination. We climbed off the ride and immediately rounded back to the line to wait to go through again. By the 10th try, we were near the end of the day and the line had grown considerably shorter.

We began to hop off to get back in line after the 10th time and the employee knew we'd be right back and said to just stay put. He had caught on to the fact that our friend was still dry. The 11th time through, still nothing. I was soaked. Twelfth time, she got a little wet. Then the magic round, the 13th try. We thought it wasn't going to happen, we'd made it through the rapids with no water on Jennifer, then we hit the waterfall and like magic, the raft spun at the last second shooting Jennifer right under the heart of the water flow. Drenched, soaked from head to foot. Not one dry spot on her. We cheered, it was finally done. Climbing out of the raft like heroes we plodded away from the ride, shoes full of water, shivering from cold, clothes and hair dripping. It really was a great day and one for the memory.