Rafting on the Nagara River

White Water Rafting!!! YEAH!!! I had a great trip on the Nagara Gawa! There were a dozen of us who took off from school to head out to the Nagara River for the day. All would have gone well EXCEPT – the lead car was FAST! We arrived just fine at the toll booth to get on the toll-way. Well, the driver hadn’t ever used it so I had to tell her what to do. When we got through – he was GONE!! And to make it worse, we had NO idea which way, north or south. Naturally, we chose the wrong way! Now, in the states it’s no big deal, go to the next exit, turn around and head back. Well….not so easy here. The next exit was like 10 miles down the road. Plus, just getting off and back on again going the opposite direction is NOT so easy. We navigated our way BACK to where we started and tried again, this time heading south.
The Nagara Gaway has many uses – not just river-rafting. We were quite surprised at how many fishermen were lined up along its banks. Now these men take their fishing quite seriously. They have bamboo poles that are roughly 10 feet long – and cost thousands of dollars. They frequently have woven, conical hats though we noted quite a few in more modern attire. I don’t they truly appreciated the antics of the rafters, though we did work at being a bit more quiet as we passed the.
The rafting was a lot of fun. It’s actually more difficult earlier in the season when the run-off is at its height. Right now the water was lower (late September) – they actually stop running late October/early November. There were actually 4 boats in our group – 2 with all Japanese and 2 for our group. You’d never have believed these were all “serious” teachers in these boats….absolutely crazy people. Our guide was from Costa Rica so we had a great mixture of Spanish, English and Japanese as we headed down the river. Check-out the pictures – we had a terrific time!