Those of you who know me know I love to travel and have adventures. This summer was a little of both. I had a few small trips and some big adventures. Summer ’12 was about mountain climbing and white water rafting and learning to Stand Up Paddle Board. Up in Quebec, Canada, I tried Via Ferrata for the first time, which is a great way to try mountain climbing. You follow a path, and clip into various pegs in the mountain as you climb. It was scary and challenging but the views were so worth it and in the end I was quite proud of myself!
Another trip to West Virginia gave me the opportunity to try rappelling and climbing, this time with a guide below to belay as I climbed up and rappelled down. I found rappelling much easier and only made it to the top of one of the cliffs we climbed. My son made it up all three and my daughter made it up to the top of two. When you rappel, the hardest part is to go over the edge. It is probably a good idea not to look down first, but I did and yikes, it was a long way straight down! The next day we tried Stand Up Paddle Boarding which was harder than it looks. Trying to keep your balance on a moving board is tough, my legs kept shaking for about the first hour.
There were a lot of big power boats throwing up wakes which made it even more challenging. My son decided to up the excitement and scaled a rock wall and jumped off the cliff, I chose to watch.
The last day of this vacation was our class IV+ rapids in a 6 person rubber raft. We had done white water in the Poconos before, but this was a much bigger experience. My daughter got launched out of the boat twice, she was not a happy camper, the first time she came up under the raft, the second time she hurt her ankle on a rock. I came away with a huge bump and bruise from getting tossed once and my son managed to stay in the raft unless he wanted to jump out and swim the smaller rapids.
It was another great vacation, lots of green mountains and clear lakes, and a star filled sky each night. As my daughter says, “Minutolo family vacations are not for the faint of heart or those afraid of heights; they are intense.”