We have a lazy start to the day - snooze from 10 AM until 11:30 AM when we get up and hang around while the brunch is prepared by the cook group. We finally eat at 1 PM. After cleaning up, we work on our journals for a short while before heading into town.
In town we go to the tour operator to go on our white water rafting trip. After waiting around for a while (these guys have to work on their punctuality), we load up the mini-bus and head out of town. After a short drive, we pull off the road at the river that we will be rafting - the Rio Trancura.
While they are getting the rafts ready, we get our equipment and get suited up. We put on wetsuits (they water is colder than the Nile River that we rafted on our Trans-Africa), booties, helmets and lifejackets. We grab a paddle and we are ready to go.
We hope into the rafts and head straight down. We end up having quite a good time. It is not as crazy and wild as rafting the source of the Nile, but still lots of fun. We do a number of grade 3 and 4 rapids which provide us with lots of water and an excellent ride. No one fell in, but we did get wet from the spray and splash. At one point, we went a bit of the wrong way and we had a struggle to get out of that spot.
Part of the way down, there is a rapid that we have to walk around - it is too dangerous to run. After we walk around through the forest, we have to jump about 5 meters from a small cliff into the river below us and then quickly swim to the raft before we get swept away. A bit scary looking down at the rushing water, but we all did it and made it to the raft in one piece.
At the end of the trip, we pulled off the river, changed in a small hut and had some coffee and biscuits before heading back to the campsite. Once at the campsite we relax for about an hour and then head into town for dinner and a look around. We buy some wine in a specialist wine shop and then we run into some of our friends from the Encounter truck. They very kindly invite us to join them for dinner, which we gladly do. It is a very nice evening and we part ways, hoping to meet up with them in Rio for carnival, if not sooner.