Mixing it up...

Last week I had the opportunity to go on a rafting trip with some of my fellow teammates down the Salmon River. Now, when you think of a rafting trip, you most likely think of sitting in a raft all day floating down a river, throwing in a few paddles here and there. While this was somewhat true, we managed to find several great running trails along the river to keep us on track with our training. A recovery week enabled us to enjoy a week with less volume but it in no way allowed us to sit in the raft all week...especially when our coach was on the trip with us!

After a 4 hour drive, which turned into 7 hours, we finally arrived at the put-in at the North Fork of the Salmon River. Much to my surprise, we managed to fit the gear of 13 paddlers into 3 gear boats!!! I was convinced that there was no way we were going to fit everything, but such was not the case. I learned that you can bring whatever luxuries you desire on a rafting trip...there is always a way to fit more. Who would go rafting without, bochi, horse shoes, a folding lawn chair, or 4 coolers full of gourmet food? These become necessities on a rafting trip!

Yep, all that gear fit in 3 boats!

The first couple days we enjoyed warm sunshine and the freedom to sleep outside without a tent. By day 3 the clouds had caught up to us and we got stuck in a thunderstorm, which lasted all night! The clouds, wind, and cold stuck around for 2 days and we were forced to sleep in our tents and bundle up in the all the clothes we brought with us.

A beautiful, sunny day on the river!

Danielle and I bundled up, the AK way, with our full-body rain suites!

Rain or shine, Mikey, Colin and I always found a way to accomplish our training for the day. There was a great trail along the river that we ran on most days. While it was a pretty well-traveled trail, we had to be very careful of poison ivy! I quickly learned what it looked like and made a cautious effort to dodge and jump over anything that resembled the plant! Luckily, we all came away from the trip unscathed! In addition to running 2-3 hours each day, we managed to do a couple strength workouts on the beach. We got creative and came up with some great exercises that I must admit, made me a little sore.

Running through the woods

We had a great trip, and I would definitely suggest doing rafting trip on your next recovery week. It is a great way to mix up the monotony of training while maintaining good fitness and experiencing a new activity.

Paddles up!