White Water Rafting in Ohiopyle PA
Well, I went white water rafting for the 2nd and 3rd times in the last 3 months in my life. This was the first time on a natural river.
Searching for a location that was challenging and close to home directed us to Ohiopyle PA and the Lower Youghiogheny River. Not to spoil the ending but it was awesome. Folks on the East Coast always hear about West Virginia or the Ocoee River as hotbeds of white water rafting but this location was great. It's about 75 miles southeast of Pittsburgh. This area is rather remote and there are not a lot of lodging options.
Hotel - Lodging
We opted to stay at the Summit Inn. A historic hotel that was nice and definitely old school. The hotel was quiet and the food was awesome. The only issue we had was that wifi is only available in the lobby so no in-room surfing. All in all a great location and wonderful hotel. The staff was very professional, helpful and made the stay for my son and I enjoyable. The hotel is also pet friendly. Check with the hotel but I believe they allow up to one 50 lb. dog / pet in your room.
Rafting Company
The rafting company we selected was the White Water Adventurers. There are five companies that service the river and all are about the same in price and offerings. We selected the mid-level difficulty trip which was the Lower Youghiogheny River trip. There is an upper river trip which is extremely tame and family friendly. One of the guides joked that he thought sections of that river went up hill.
Logistics
The trips go off at designated times during the day as you are in a group of rafts with a group of guides. All the rafting companies share a parking lot and transportation from the lot to the river entry point. The lot is about 5 minutes outside of the small town of Ohiopyle. The times of the trips are staggered so that each company can use the busses and entry point before the next crew shows up.
You need to make reservations either on-line or at the store in town, They were not able to accept reservations or payment at the check in booth on the lot. We reserved the Friday 10:30 am trip and arrived early for check in and only waited a few minutes. There are changing rooms and rest rooms to use while you wait and after you return from your trip. Showers are there as well.
At 10:30 am we received a brief safety demonstration and got our personal flotation devices and helmets on and boarded the bus.
After the 5-10 minute bus trip to the river's entrance in town we received a more thorough briefing, our paddles and raft assignments. As it was only my son and I, we were paired up with another family to fill out our raft. Each raft has up to 6 people (maybe 7 with a guide).
After you're briefing and assignment you carry your raft about 200 - 300 yards down into the water and load up. After everyone is loaded you paddle across the river for instructions on navigating the first set of rapids. And then you are off.Depending on the water level there are two options for the guides. If it is low or normal (which it was for us) then there are 4-5 guides in kayaks and rubber kayaks (duckies) that float with you and guide you down the river. If the river is high then there is a guide in each raft. There is also a guide in the all important lunch raft.
This trip has level III and IV rapids and was challenging for us. Essentially on the river you have rapids and calm eddies after each section, so you get in a cadence of congregating in an eddy for instructions and directions on navigating the next rapids. Everyone goes through the rapids and then regroups for the next rapids and directions. There are also 3 sections along the river where the calm area is longer and you can get out and swim. Cold, cold cold but you actually work up a sweat so it does feel good.
After the first rapids they take your picture going through and have them available for purchase when you get back to the parking area.The guides were excellent, patient and knowledgeable about the river and white water rafting. The first day (Friday we had 6 rafts and the second day Sunday we had 16 rafts). As you can imagine for the guides it amounted to herding cats getting all 16 rafts down the river safely. On the Sunday trip we had 1 raft of inexperienced rafters /swimmers that abandoned after the entrance rapids. After the first rapids I don't think you can abandon as you get further into the state park and really can't turn back. On the second day we actually overturned the entire raft and all of us where catapulted into the water quickly. Without warning we were all in the water which was a little scary. Once I located my son I was fine, but did bounce along the rocks for some time. Another raft rescued us and we regrouped and remounted our raft.
Nose and Toes up — is a key mantra and important. The water is fast and the risk of getting your feet stuck on a bottom rock or log is real. The only way to avoid that is to not try and stand up and to float down river feet first until someone can rescue you.Our trip lasted a little over 4 hours on Friday (30 min stopped for lunch) and 4.5 hours on Sunday.
You will paddle and you will get wet. You're in a rubber raft with water coming over the top as you go through the rapids and waves. Depending on your experience level, and the ability of your boat mates to row together, you may dump in the water.
Tips
- Try and have an even number in your raft. Even numbers seem to make it easier for balancing and rowing.
- If you want a special sandwich or something for lunch pack it your self and give it the Lunch Raft guide and they will put it in the cooler and distribute it when you get the lunch spot. That's what we did and worked out well for my son and his new braces.
- Go during the week if possible even in the summer as you have few rafts and flow of your group is better
- The weekend trip was busy and we did wait longer between each rapid for the group to regroup and start again.
Summary
All and all a great experience and wonderful active time. Highly Recommend it.
Should I Stay or Go
Should I Stay Or GoWe all age. At some point we are all going to die.
When you get the call that it looks like someone is on the other side of recovery you have some tough decisions to make. Should you stay or go? When do you choose your family over your job? Every time might be your knee jerk answer.
In these times is that really true? When I was faced with this decision after getting a call from my brother regarding my father I was in Europe for work. Not easy to just jump in the car and get over there. There was a bit of coordination and additional cost involved. I also wanted to manage the guilt I was feeling towards my job performance. What would leaving early do to my performance and effectiveness as a leader within the Finance group?
Here in the U.S. there is so much insecurity, some imagined but some real about losing your job, or moving lower down the pecking order. This can be especially true when your focus and balance swings more towards your family. You need to figure out where that balance is and how to manage through it.
Call it real or not but I was really conflicted with deciding if I should have left Paris and jumped on a plane or stayed. The guilt I was feeling for abandoning my work was real, the money involved in the trip, the cost of returning home early was real and significant. I was comparing that guilt to the thought that he would pull through and it would be a "false alarm".
In the end, I waited a few days and then cut my trip early to go back home. The fact my boss demanded that I get on the plane and go helped the decision. Hey, maybe I'm the odd ball but it was a tough decision for me as I always try to balance work and home. But I feel good about the decision now. I think you need to make sure that the guilty feeling is not overwhelming and will not haunt you (on both the side of family and career). Replacing that guilt with the feeling of being able to say good bye is comforting. I know it was the right decisions but that didn't make it any easier for me.
Maybe it was a little bit of insecurity on my part and overly concerned about my job. But when I thought about it logically there was no way that leaving to go home would impact my job. But it still weighed on my mind.
It was the right call, my father passed away five days later.
Knee Injury Turning a Negative into a Positive
Everyone who takes up a sport or physical activity has an injury at some point.For me it was ice hockey.Although I'm in a non-contact league, there is still contact and that turned into a meniscus injury.The Doctor says nothing torn so six weeks of non-impact exercise and I should be back on the road.Sounds like my training is on-hold for a month and a half.
Not so quick.For me this is a great opportunity to focus on the two disciplines that don't involve impact: swimming and cycling.
Off to trainingpeaks.com to set up 6 weeks of training focused on swimming, cycling, and one weekly session of upper body strength training.And for me swimming and cycling are my weakest links so this is a huge opportunity to focus on these two disciplines.
My six week general plan includes:
- Monday - upper body strength training
- Tuesday, Friday, Sunday - of cycling (2 indoor on trainer 1 longer ride outdoors)
- Wednesday, Saturday - swimming (Indoor masters swim team - Up and Running)and 1 outdoors)
- Thursday - Rest day
This has really helped me as I am in active rehab of my knee and really feel no pain while working out.I have focused on 4 hours of training per week on a 3 - 1 sequence. (3 heavy and 1 recovery).I am easing into this new triathlon thing as I have 34 weeks (as of this post) until my A event the Raleigh 70.3 in June 2016.
I am also using the time to work on and refine my annual training plan and enjoying the immersive learning process with my new sporting endeavor.I have been reading and researching training plans as my goal is to really build a good base and then start with a formal training plan 24 weeks out from Raleigh.
Even with the injury I am able to increase my fitness and focus on two discipline [I haven't focused on in years.A positive in my book.Have you had any experiences like this?
The Power of 30 Minutes to Change Your Life
A mindless TV sitcom, A bowl of ice cream, a cigar... Things you can do in 30 minutes. What if you spent 30 minutes a day to change your life by just moving?
On July 1, 2014 I had enough of how I felt, looked and I was seriously concern over where this was all taking me. 51 years old and over 230 pounds I decided I was going to do something about it.
Over the years I had crafted complex workout and exercise plans (typically around Jan 1) that I inevitably stopped or was unable to follow. And like many people, that led to the feeling of failure from which I never got back on the horse. Not anymore.
On July 1, 2014 I decided and committed to moving for 30 minutes a day; every day. No elaborate exercise plans with heart rate, distance, effort goals; just moving 30 minutes everyday; no matter what. I wasn't even concerned about changing my eating habits just moving for 30 minutes.
I was inspired by James Clear who wrote a post called How to Stop Procrastinating on Your Goals by Using the “Seinfeld Strategy” where he mentioned Jerry Seinfeld's commitment strategy of writing every day. Jerry built a simple system that he focused on which had nothing to do with results, only the process.
The way I viewed it there are really very few failure points (only one) and a clear easy way to measure progress. I set up a quick Google Docs spreadsheet and tracked day, time moving, location, and description, and a counter for keeping track of the consecutive days moving. Nothing more.
This started out as walking for 30 minutes a day (which my two dogs are thoroughly loving). I just walked for 36 straight days and really enjoyed it. But what started to happen was remarkable. I started to feel better both physically but mentally as I had kept up with an exercise plan for 36 days and I wasn't overworked, sore, burned out. I felt great. It was not always easy, I can remember hustling down to the workout room in my Sydney AZ hotel at 11:00 at night to get in 30 minutes on the treadmill after an all day flight into town.
Now that I was having success with an easy workout plan I started to development a healthy mindset. I started to wonder how I could move in other ways. So after a year I have moved by:
Playing Ice HockeyWhite Water RaftingKayakingSwimmingWeight TrainingCyclingRunningJump RopingLateral X machineKettlebellsRoller BladingSplitting Wood
I have been lucky enough to do my 30 minute move in a lot of different placesDayton, OhioCharlotte, NCRaleigh, NCNew York, NYNashville, TNLondon, UKParis , FRSydney, AZDubai, UABManila, Philippines
In just the first year I have lost 23 pounds and dropped 4 inches off my pants size, and I feel much better. With the successful reinforcement of my success I naturally started looking at my eating process and have slowly started to change those processes a well.
TakeawaysWhat if I expanded this approach into other areas of my life? Would it work? I put a process in place to track reading and media consumption per day. Through print books and audible books I consume at least 20 minutes per day of great content. This can be fiction, non-fiction, whatever but I set up the system so that I get 20 minutes of great content daily. No TV doesn't count for me.
What could you do at work with this systematic approach? How about making sure you give 10 compliments or signs of gratitude for people a work a day?
What about spending quality time with your family or a significant other X times / minutes a day or week or month? I am a firm believer that what you focus on improves and if you put the system in place you will move forward. Make the barrier to success so low that you can miss it and you will quickly see the momentum these systems can generate.
How can you use this approach? Let us know in the comments below.
Preseason games are great outings
Sports preseason games are great outings for friends and families. In the US the four major sports have preseason or exhibition games. These games are typically not as well attended as the regular season games and are great opportunities to experience a fun day out.
- There are fewer people at preseason games then regular season games so parking, concessions, and dare I say the restrooms, are not nearly as crowded.
- Usually the best seats are held by season ticket holders. Season ticket holders don't attend all the preseason games so there are great seats available. All the major sports have authorized reseller programs for season ticket holders so you don't have to resort to "Mr. Need tickets" on the street corner.
- You get to see a mix of established veteran players along with the future stars that will be playing in the league in the future.
- For baseball you can also turn it into a vacation as baseball's preseason is in Arizona and Florida. Great places to visit in the February - March timeframe.
- The baseball preseason or spring training stadiums are also much smaller than the major league parks so you can really get awesome views of your favorite teams.
Here is Central Ohio my family and I went over to Columbus for the last Blue Jackets game and had a great time. The entertainment district around the area didn't have the usual crowds so we were able to get a table for dinner at Ted's Montana Grill after 10 minute wait. A great way to get ready for the game.
We picked up great seats 3 rows off the ice which were great. My wife was even able to get a great shot of Mr. Carrie Underwood to send off to her country music loving mother!
When you start thinking that those awesome seats are out of reach for you and your family think again, exhibition games for your favorite teams may be the answer.
Welcome to Jdhayes.com
You're never too old to get in shape, learn a new skill or to enjoy a new hobby. Life should never slow down. I should know, I am in my early fifties and in the last four years I have taken up ice hockey, started training for my first triathlon, started a daily exercise streak that is over 400 days long, started a couple of blogs, and taken up fishing again, just to name a few items. I enjoy writing about the things I enjoy, all while managing a successful career as a finance executive. I love enjoying my passions and finding new ones! You can do this too.
Here at jdhayes.com I will share with you what I am doing, enjoying, thinking about doing and take you along with me on the journey to enjoy life and to continue to push myself forward. Hey, I'm in finance and not a doctor or health care professional, but will share what has worked for me, what hasn't and what I am enjoying. My hope that you will be inspired to get up and enjoy. You really can enjoy anything you put your mind to.
I will share what sports I am involved in, what I'm learning, information on everything from photography, fishing, fly tying, personal improvement, technology, to Disney. I hope you will come back and enjoy what you see and read.
JDhayes.com is about exploring and taking action, making choices and constantly challenging yourself. I might even share the latest board game I'm enjoying.
Come along on the journey.