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The raft was hard-hit and about to capsize. I was wondering what would happen to Wagner if it did.

So what happened? Well, according to the guides watching the video at the end of the day, "Deuce saved the boat."

How?

It seems that by hanging onto the side & trying to drag my ass back on board, I had inadvertantly kept the thing from flipping.

Yep, that's me -- human ballast.

In that second plunge, Dave got blown off the other side of the raft. That's his head bobbing in the water to the left (sans cap -- fortunately, he had an extra).
Here's Renee trying to yank me back on the raft. You should have seen her face when I yanked one of my hands away. "Hang on a second," I shouted. We're still in the midst of rapids, we've got two people in the water, and I'm pulling my hand back?
Let me explain. See, rushing water will strip clothes right off your body -- and the quick-dry fishing pants I was wearing have built-in underwear. You lose those pants, you go naked. They were already down to my knees. So I needed my free hand to pull my pants back on. (Strangely, throughout the whole thing my sunglasses and hat didn't come off.) Having done that, we managed to get Dave and me reboarded. I landed with my back on the floor of the raft. Then I found I couldn't get up--one of the paddles had become stuck in my lifejacket. But that didn't take long to remedy.

Cap'n Crunch was our first rapids of the day. It wasn't a promising start, but we got better real fast. In fact, we got pretty damn good at maneuvering the raft. It was a blast. Whenever we were in rapids, I couldn't stop laughing. Laura said I never stopped laughing even when I was overboard.

Truth is, getting thrown into the rapids was the most fun part of the trip. But I was black & blue the next morning: know what causes rapids? BOULDERS.

Dumbass in the Drink Dumbass in the Drink at 25 percent speed