Personal Narrative: The Nantahala River

Water rushing, pushing, and pulling our raft down the river. The crystal clear liquid leaves nothing to the imagination as I eagerly peer over the edge of the boat, frantically searching the round stones for the mysterious Giant Salamander said to be native to these waters.

I had recently watched a documentary show on these Giant Salamanders, and the researchers were overturning rocks and searching in crevices waist deep in these very waters. The Nantahala River, located near Bryson City North Carolina, is home to many aquatic creatures, including this elusive Giant Salamander.

As a child living in the mountains, I had access to hundreds of acres of land to find as many creatures as I could. I would dig in the dirt looking for worms, overturn

rocks to find rolly pollies, splash around in creeks to find crawdads, look under bushes for black snakes, etc. I was a curious kid with no boundaries and endless amounts of wonder. I wanted to search for anything and everything. Except spiders. I don’t do spiders.
This particular day was beautiful and perfect for rafting. The sun was high, the air was warm, and the water was crisp and cool. Some people might say the water was too cold, I mean it is a mountain river, but kids don’t notice trivial things like that. They jump in without thinking and don’t even flinch when the crisp water invades their life vest. They’re too busy searching for critters and challenging each other to a game of skipping stones to think about anything else.
I was with my mother, the raft guide, my two best friends, Katya and Matt, and their mother Janet, who is also my mother’s best friend.

We were a crowd of trouble, or maybe it was just me who was trouble. My Aunt did nickname me Hurricane Haley when I was younger since I was a bundle of energy no one could stop…and it was my first time rafting. Great, what could go wrong?

I grew up around here. The Nantahala Outdoor Center (NOC) was a second home and I was well known and well looked after by all the NOC workers since both my parents were expert guides there: my mother, a raft/kayak instructor, my father, one of the top canoe instructors in the country. This was where they met, fell in love, and later raised me—their wild child.

Even before I was born, I had a little taste of nature. My mother was rafting, with my father and some of their friends when she lost her balance on an easy rapid. She was falling toward the water, and I went right along with her since she was 8 months pregnant with me at the time. My father, having insane fast reflexes, caught my mother right as her head skimmed the water before she could fall into the river completely. This was how I was named, you see. My name Haley came from part of the river’s name: the Nantahala (Nanta-hala). I don’t know if this is where they really got my name, but it’s a cool story, and it’s nice to know I have some roots in the place my parents’ thought was so

special.
The adventures didn’t stop when I was born either. It’s like the moment I was pulled out of my mother’s tummy, my parents already had the plan to take me everywhere with them. I was a little baby, barely a few months old, and they had me strapped up in a baby life vest riding along with every stroke of the paddle in my fathers canoe, or bouncing along in my baby backpack on my mother’s back while hiking. My parents were adventurers, and I was their little explorer. They didn’t stop for anything and I’m glad they didn’t. I have some pretty cool photos to this day of both of these activities, and many more. They could have left me with a babysitter, but they didn’t. They didn’t have the money nor the want to leave me behind so, instead, I went everywhere with them. I was their little bundle of joy and they wanted to show me everything, even if I was only a few months old and wouldn’t be able to remember it.
What I do remember, though, is the excitement and anticipation flowing through my veins that day. I was finally going rafting! For years I watched hundreds of people every day go rafting, canoeing, and kayaking down that river as I played in the shallows. People would exit the river in one of three ways:
1. Looking green like they were about to throw up
2. Frightened as hell, still clutching the side of the raft for dear life
3. Excited with a big grin splitting their face because they conquered the rapids and lived
I knew which emotion I would show and couldn’t contain the smile on my face as we loaded onto the shuttle to take us further up the river to our launching site.
The bus ride to our launch site made me even more anxious. The deep green trees seemed to sluggishly inch by outside the window, meanwhile I was bouncing around in my seat, too excited to sit still. We finally made it to our destination a grueling twenty minutes later, and I sprang out of the bus and thundered down the gravel path toward the rushing water. The big yellow and red rafts were already there, sitting by the water’s edge, eagerly waiting to ride the rapids. My mom and the rest of our crew finally made it to the clearing, loaded down with our paddles, helmets, and life vests. I snatched my gear from my mom uttering an apology about leaving it on the bus while I hastily threw on the bright orange vest and matching helmet. I picked up my paddle and headed for the raft, but my mothers voice brought me back to the group because we had to go over some safety lessons.
My mother easily went through the mantra of rules she’s probably said thousands of times before to other rafting groups. She told us about always tightly grasping the T-grip on the top of the paddle so we wouldn’t lose the paddle or hit someone else with it because God knows how many peoples’ noses have been broken that way. She told us to tuck our feet under the thwart, the two rubber tubes that go across the raft, so we could keep our balance while paddling. She warned us about what to do in worse case scenarios if we were thrown out of the raft:
1. Try and keep ahold of your paddle if you fall in so that you can reach toward the raft for someone to snag and pull you in.
2. Tuck your feet up so they don’t get caught on any rocks under water and you drown.
3. Try and face downstream so you can use your feet to push off of rocks and see where you’re going.
4. Keep your butt up and head up.
5. And, most of all, don’t panic.
She then carefully demonstrated the proper technique for the different paddle strokes we would perform while rafting, showing us the graceful movements of the forward stroke, right draw, left draw, and reverse stroke. I tried to pay attention to her movements, but my eyes kept glancing at the rushing water. The anticipation to raft was too great and my mom had to keep snapping my attention back to her as we copied her movements, over and over again, until she was finally satisfied we performed them right, and she announced we were ready for the water!
The five of us crowded around the raft and hefted it up and into the water. My heart was pounding, threatening to come out of my chest as I clambered in over the blown up rubber sides. My mother took her guide position at the back, Janet and Katya in the middle, and Matt and I were the two brave souls in the front, ready to hang on for dear life since the front of the raft is where the most action happens. My hand tightly grips the top of the paddle as I dip it into the water and yank it back with all my might. Finally, I’m truly rafting!
Heart pounding, hands sweating, arms aching. Our raft flew through the water, gliding over rocks, bouncing over rapids, water spraying everything. We were on the section of the river called Pattons Run. Most of this section is considered Class 2 and Class 3, which means it consists of some small ripples and rapids, mostly calmer water with a few shallow parts. It has one Class 4 section, toward the end, where it gets rougher and contains one small waterfall drop.
We stopped at one of the shallow areas, pulled our raft onto the bank of the river, and took a pause. We were all soaked through with sweat so, the first thing I did, after chucking my helmet and paddle into the raft, was sink into the cool crisp water. I could see the bottom where my feet and butt were resting. It was like looking through crystal clear glass. I could see the speckled green and brown stones resting on the bottom, their edges perfectly smoothed by the rushing water into thick hamburger patty looking shapes. I would overturn some of the bigger stones searching, once again, for that gosh darn elusive Giant Salamander, but I never found anything and my short attention span got the best of me and I gave up looking. Instead, I splashed and pranced in the calf deep water, reveling in the cool liquid. Katya and Matt soon challenged me to a game of skipping stones, and it was a race to see who would be first to find the perfect stone that was shaped just right to skip over the surface of the water.
We spent only enough time at the shallow spot for our parents to rest up and then, once again, we hit the water, except this time the waterfall was coming up. Heart pounding. Ears ringing. Palms sweaty, threatening to let my paddle slip from my grasp. My mother directed us to the perfect spot for us to go over the edge. I remember now, it wasn’t as big as I thought it would be. It was still a challenging fall, don’t get me wrong. My stomach still dropped as we went over the edge, but it wasn’t the Niagara Falls drop you would imagine from a movie. No, it was only a few feet high. I braced my feet under the thwart, held onto my paddle for dear life, and yelled for the thrill of it as we went crashing down over the edge. Stomach in my mouth. Muscles clinched rock hard, braced and ready. I barely stayed in the raft as the front end plunged into the whitewater like the boat was going under, but it popped back up and my mother yelled for us to get our butts into gear paddling.
The rest of the trip was a blur as we battled some of the bigger rapids. Once we finally made it to the calm water ending, we could all relax our tightly coiled muscles and breath a sigh of relief. We made it! And guess who had the biggest smile lighting up her 6-year-old face? I was coasting high on the adrenaline rush and was probably a little out of my mind because next thing I know, I’m looking down into the water thinking, “Oh its not that deep, I bet I can find that salamander now.” These were my famous last words I uttered as I jumped out of the raft into the cool water once again. My mother yelling “NO!” as my feet hit the water. Too late. This time the water definitely wasn’t shallow.
I plunged into the deep and took in a sharp, water filled breath as my head was swallowed by the clear liquid. No sound. Just the frantic beat of my heart. Water pulling and pushing, threatening to push me deeper. Legs kicking. Arms shoving. Lungs burning. Hands trying to grab the water like a safety line from the surface. Eyes looking up at the blue tinted sun streaming down from above. My head broke the surface I and sputtered for air as I choked and coughed up the inhaled water. A two thousand pound weight dropped in my stomach. My raft, already further downstream, out of reach. I yelled for help and stupidly realized I was breaking all the rules. I didn’t have my paddle with me, so I snatched my feet up and used my hands to steer me straight in the water.
I was lucky we were at the end of the rafting course, close to the takeout spot, because there were a few other rafts out in the water. I yelled for help as I careened by another raft and luckily I was within reach. Acting fast, one of the ladies on the front of the raft extended her paddle out to me and my little fingers greedily snatched the end. She heaved me through the water, grabbed the straps of my life vest, and hauled me into her boat with her crew. I was safe. Thank God. I was panting hard trying to regain my breath as the lady who pulled me out patted my back.
We made it to the riverbank where my friends and mother waited. I climbed out of the raft but, this time, I waited for the all clear to jump out. I expected my mother to be mad but she was just smiling at me shaking her head.
“Thank you for grabbing my girl,” my mom told the Good Samaritan who pulled me out.
“Thank you,” I shyly whispered as my embarrassed cheeks lit up red.
We laughed about my stupid mistake all the way home and we still laugh about it when this story comes up. If that lady and her crew hadn’t been there and pulled me out of the water when they did, I would have drifted down the river into the rough water down stream; the section of the river that’s reserved for Olympic kayak practice since the rapids get bigger and the water becomes rougher…All because I wanted to find that damn Giant Salamander.