Toast for Brekkie

Bone-breakin' swamp boggin'

So Toufan and I took a couple noobs out on the jetskis today: our good friends Farah and Fere. Four people on two jetskis; we took turns driving up and down the shallow, narrow switchbacks and billabongs of the St. Johns headwaters. The girls even learned how to handle a PWC. We had lunch at the Lone Cabbage, a riverside honky tonk and biker bar, complete with live music (yes, they played Skynyrd). Everything was going great. Until the rope swing.

Mind you, I had a good time:

But then, I have experience with rope swings. This one was particularly technical, if you can apply that term to a rope swing, because it required a leap, a good grip, and a tight tuck to clear a steel retaining wall. Especially if you chose to go from up in the tree.

Farah went from the wall itself first, so we all assumed she could go from the tree. Everyone, myself included, was encouraging her to go for it but I had a bad feeling about it from the beginning. After ten minutes of vacillating and several failed countdowns, she went for it and...

hesitated. She leapt, but then tried to pull back. This put her off balance from the beginning, and the poor girl didn't make it over the wall. I don't think I'll ever be able to forget the sound of her hitting that wall, then tumbling into the water. She's fine now, don't worry, but let's just say it was an adventure carrying an injured passenger home through a labyrinthine swamp populated by eight-foot gators (trust me, we saw over fifteen, including a 13-footer). But about two seconds after that picture you see above, she broke her finger. Believe me when I say, however, that it could have been much worse.

We love you Farah! Hope you're not too afraid to come play with us again. Get well soon!

To everyone else that would like to join us, put some time in on your local jungle gym, and you can look like this:

Posted by George at November 5, 2006 09:22 PM