Arung Jeram or white water rafting is the challenging recreational outdoor activity of using an inflatable raft to navigate a river or other bodies of water. This is usually done on white water or different degrees of rough water, in order to thrill and excite the raft passengers. The development of this activity as a leisure sport has become popular since the mid-1970s. It is considered an extreme sport, as it can be dangerous (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafting).
Yes, On Saturday July 7th2013, My friends and I tried this kind of challenging sport in Pandansari-Talun, Batang- Pekalongan. Initially, My friend, Uma informed me that there’s a interesting and challenging rafting in Pandansari, She called me and asked me to join it. Then, I accepted.
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| Arung Jeram. Water rafting with my friends |
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| We're five in a team in the white water rafting in Pandansari-Tahun, Batang Pekalongan |
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| Pose dulu ah sebelum water rafting |
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| The handsome, Almusto firsly tested before taking the real whit water rafting |
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| Sungai untuk Arung Jeram di daerah Batang Pekalongan |
We were 5 persons joining thewhite water rafting in Pandansari: Almusto, Uma, Santi, Asih and Ida. One boy and the others werw girls. Wow, it sounds so so great. Yeah, I was, my self alone, I mean I was the only boy in a team of the rafting. But it’s Okay.
Finally, we arrived at the place we’re waiting for. Firstly, we had to register for the rafting. We were all 5 members then guided by three guards who guided us during the journey of rafting in the river there. Before going to the river, we took photograph together wearing the rafting suit. Wow, we looked so so nice with the suits. The guards helped us taking our pictures.
Well, it was time to go over there. The time showed at half past two p.m. We had to walked bringing the tire float(buoy) which had been prepared by the owner. One person brought one tire. After arriving there, the leader of the guards give a brief explanation of the rafting techniques. He told that, one of us should be tested first, floating alone using one tire a few kilometers long. Yes, time up, we then picked up by a car to go straight to the real place of white water rafting. We took some minutes to get there by the car passing along the river banks.
Praise to Allah, we finally arrive at the real site for the rafting. The guards then arranged and tied the tire with rope. The tires were arranged like a train carriage. There were eight tires. The front was the guard, followed by me(Almusto), Asih, Santi, Uma, Ida and the rest are the other two guards. we became a unified team to go along the rough river. Everyone had to place his/her tire, we laid down the tires like we slept. Our feet were unified to the arm-pits of others’. Everyone should kept him/herself during the journey and his/her team.
It’s time to go. After we were ready, we finally started our journey going down along the river. It was some kilometers long. We passed the rough river, we passed the stones, and the hard stream of the river. We also passed some wood bridges. Maybe this is the hardest one. During passing the bridges, we had to lower ourselves otherwise hit them. We really had a bad experience during the journey, one of our members named, Ida, she hit the wood bridge on her upper lip. She hurt herself. It was a pity of her. Praise to God, afterwards everything was Okay. We could finish the route of rafting. We felt happy during the journey although there was a little problem. You can imangine our heart bit so fast during going down the river. Anyways, it’s such a challenging experience we have never had before.
The rafting was over. It was at half pas four p.m. everyone was wet. It’s a pity, we all didn’t bring the change clothes. We missed the ashar praying. We took a rest at the owner’s house. We ate and drink food. Alhamdulillah one of the guard stook our pictures during the journey. So we can document our rafting although the pictures are not clear enough because the pictures were taken by a vga camera. I, myself felt a little disappointed. We really satisfied with the water rafting we had. Finally we said good bye to the owner and had to leave the site. We went home at 05.00 p.m.
