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The Ultimate Adventure: Skydiving, Riverboarding, and Rafting

Whitewater rafting is an ultimate experience by anyone’s standards, but the tough Class V Penobscot River has chutes, drops, and large holes that challenge both guide and guest alike. In exciting rapids like Exterminator, Cribworks, and the Nesowdnehunk Falls, I quickly learned that I could easily be in over my head, but the guides are experts and carefully selected to make the ride both safe and exciting. It is 13 miles of pure adrenaline, yet I still found the time to look up and enjoy the breath-taking scenery that surrounded me.

Before we even left the training waters, one guest paddled himself out of the raft, and we realized that rafting is not all about muscles or size. The white water was in my face and I was soaked to the bone, but I managed to stay in the raft. During the very little down time the Penobscot offers, I went for swim in the white waters.

The Penobscot River has long been a popular spot for whitewater rafting, but now Penobscot Adventures is kicking it up a notch and giving people a chance to run the rapids without the boat. It’s called riverboarding and Penobscot Adventures is the only outdoor adventure company in New England that does it.

After a day of rafting, my arms were tired and my back was tight, but we set out to reach the shore of the Penobscot and get our first look at the rapids from a boarder’s perspective. There were wetsuits, life jackets, helmets, and even fins to go with the boards, but the view was still intimidating. Seeing the water rushing and the white caps foaming looked dangerous; that’s why the trip started with a safety lesson.

We learned about currents and the all-important signals; including the panic signal of waving your arms frantically in the air – it seemed pretty straightforward. With the help of guides Karl and Mike, we finally began to tackle the whitewater. The first step was to swim across the river against a powerful current, which was not easy; it was more work than fun.

The ride down the rapids was intense. As the water smashed against my face and I missed the surf, I became more and more comfortable with the frightening situation. However, there’s really nothing that can prepare you for a wall of whitewater rushing at your head, and while it’s intense, I did it over and over again.

Riverboarding is relatively new in North America, but jumping off the raft and grabbing a board was nothing compared to the adventure that lay ahead. There is nothing natural about falling 11,000 feet through the sky, but I was going to give it a try with Skydive New England Jump and Raft.

The pages upon pages of waivers I had to sign before jumping proved skydiving is an extreme adventure sport. Then I had to watch a video that stressed the fact that I could die, and watch several other people take the plunge before I could jump myself, but the technicalities could never outweigh the natural high of putting yourself in the scariest situation imaginable and confronting that fear head on.

My heart pounded in my chest as I waited for the 20-minute flight away from Millinocket airport. If I thought about it, I wouldn’t do it. I didn’t want to overanalyze the situation. I jumped at the idea of skydiving, but now that I was in the plane, my inhabitations were taking over. But the fear deep in my chest was part of the thrill.

The door opened at 11,000 feet and my instructor, Pat, told me it was time to go. Leaving the plane was the hardest part, especially since I had a death grip on the door of the plane, but free-falling through the sky at 200km/h was exhilarating; it literally took my breath away. The wind felt like a cushion of air suspending me in space; it was more like I was floating than falling! Once the parachute opened, my instructor and I glided gently back to earth and I could see everything that Maine has to offer.

Although the total dive time, from exiting the plane to reaching the ground, was only six minutes, when I touched the ground, I was on top of the world. Leonardo da Vinci said, “For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been and there you long to return.” I’ve even considered taking up a career in skydiving.

Adventure sports and the pursuit of adrenaline fueled activities has become an increasingly sought after diversion from the 9 to 5 monotony of everyday life. Many people are embracing what nature has to offer by doing things like skydiving, riverboarding, and whitewater rafting. In the past, many people opted for just one adventure sport, but nowadays most people not only take it to the skies or the river, but they combine the two! Due to the massive uptake of extreme sports, many companies are developing whole new concepts such as Jump and Raft. I can’t wait to see what happens next!

© Lesley Boutilier

Raft the amazing Dead or Kennebec rivers, and — also for a short time — buy a gift certificate for friends or family at 40% off. Hey, Christmas is coming up, surprise your loved ones with some summer fun!

Our friends at Social Boston Sports came up our way and crashed through some rapids and enjoyed some late night R&R last year at Three Rivers. Check out the video to see the fun, and don’t miss our other rafting videos on MySpace!

We had the pleasure of welcoming Annemarie Roberts and Anne-Marie Maheux, contest winners, and Katy England, staff writer of the Maine Edge, to raft and jump with us recently. You can read the whole article on the Edge website, but let us tell you first — it was a heck of a fun time!

It’s our greatest pleasure to welcome people who’ve never jumped OR rafted before and to expose them to the thrills and safety of these exciting sports. We particularly loved this line:

“Whitewater rafting is not like going to a theme park – it’s a river; there’s no lever that makes the ride stop … I quickly came to the conclusion that roller coasters, waterslides and other fun theme park rides are merely pale imitators of rafting.”

Thanks again to the Maine Edge for coming to raft with us — we hope we’ll see you again soon!

Every true raft guide we know has got “sugar plums of giant whitewater” dancing in their heads. It is supposed to snow more! The snowmobiling is still great, we skied yesterday and it was awesome, but even while enjoying these great winter sports those whitewater sugar plums just keep dancing, and then you look up at the sky and the day dream off jumping from a plane and flying truly free sneaks in.

Damn, I’ve got to stop with the day dreaming and finish getting ready for what I hope is going to be the greatest summer of all time. Life is short, join me for some fun. That is what is most important in life! Come on yall, write in this blog and let me hear your summer day dreams.

Three Rivers Whitewater has grown to offer many events and different types of fun, so many that it’s hard to put on finger on what makes it special. From our perspective, it is the people who come to visit us and have fun. You make it worth all the hard work and as the years go by we realize that we have made thousands of great friends. So again we say THANK YOU! You are the best! Let’s have fun together forever!

We’ll continue to create great adventures as long as you keep coming to the “Home of Serious Fun.” Lift is short! Do it all!

Joe

The 2008 River release schedules are out and we are getting them posted on the rest of the website as we speak. The Dead River Releases and Kennebec Huge Water Releases are going to be awesome and with all the rain we have had this fall the watershed will still be ahead come spring. Now all we need is snow.
Speaking of snow, we are ready for snowmobile season! The firewood is all put up and as soon as the snow flies we will be riding, skiing, snow shoeing, and skating. Winter in the great white north is awesome. Check out www.threeriverssnow.com The big New Years Eve party is booking up fast so make your reservation ASAP. It is going to be a great bash and I will try to stay out of trouble this year!

Hey, and time is running out for our 40% off special! Yes — 40% off! No joke! We’re also offering 40% off on gift certificates, and an incredible $229 deal on Jump and Raft trips! Don’t miss out!

More exciting news to come, so stay tuned!

Thanks to WABI 5 in Bangor, Maine for taking the time to video our latest rafting and skydiving antics. Now get up here and get yourself into a raft while the whitewater season’s still here!

The sunsets have been just as terrific, with clear, crisp skies and captivating views of Mount Katahdin from our Millinocket Outpost or looking over the ridge of green pine trees at the Forks base and watching the sun fade away at the end of another picture-perfect rafting-packed summer’s day.

And now, it looks like it’ll be the busiest weekend in Three Rivers history — we have more than twenty rafting trips at both bases on Saturday and all our skydiving tours are booked solid! We also have the Chris Fitz Band playing the Forks and The 3 Horsemen in Millinocket.

This past weekend, Brown Ledge Camp brought their very musical junior counselors for a Kennebec River overnight. In addition, Better Hockey and Dover Recreation Department came to enjoy some whitewater rafting with us.

With more spectacular summer weather on the way, warm weather, great fun, and of course, more and more rafting, the water’s looking good here at Three Rivers. Hope you come up to enjoy it with us!

Come nightfall, the band One to Louder hosted the biggest party so far this season, and JC and the Pickups played two days over the weekend. All three Christopher brothers were hanging around the Forks all weekend long as well as Lauren McGrath & family, Jen and Noli and several other veteran Three Rivers Whitewater Guides.

With rafting at its peak, ample sun, tons of guests and more fun than you can shake a paddle at, time’s never been better to take a rafting trip here at Three Rivers!