Tuesday, 9 July 2013

Kayaking at MacRitchie

The beginning of a perfect Sunday morning saw a bunch of twelve of us at MacRitchie Reservoir on the dot of 9 Am, oddly everyone conforming to the plan despite the  commuting uncertainties and delays. Kudos to the thread of fifty plus emails planning and discussing the logistics!! 

Without further ado, we made a beeline for renting the Kayaks. The guy explained to us some simple and easy-to-follow rules to be complied to during Kayaking. Aquaphobic people being a bit reluctant had to be coaxed to join us for this exciting water sport, and they mustered enough courage to get onto to the double seater kayaks. Wearing the armour like life-jacket, each couple held the hefty kayaks and marched towards the pontoon like army jawans. It was a bright sunny day, conveniently refuting the forecasts of rains and storms.


We all cautiously boarded our respective Kayaks and started hand paddling. I and Mrinal were together, and tried coordinating our paddling by saying- left-right-left. Being amateur kayakers, we were putting in all the energy to propel ourselves forward by pulling the water behind,  resulting in the water splashing all over and leaving us completely sodden. We thoroughly enjoyed getting acquainted to the skills essential to move the kayak forward-backward, turn and prevent hitting someone or the trees/land- it was an experience of a kind! 



Not much later, we saw Keerthana's and Dhiren-Amar's kayak coming close to each other, and in the blink of an eye their kayak capsized making Amar and Dhiren fall into the water. Several sincere attempts of getting onto the kayak again were all in vain. It freaked us out, Mrinal started whistling (attached to lifejacket), our other friend's Kayaks gathered closer only to realize that it was Dhiren- Amar  who fell into the water. Dhiren appeared nonchalant and managed to get onto the Kayak again, while Amar (being one of the aquaphobics) turned frantic and felt his life jacket wasn't helping him keep afloat, and that he was going to drown. There was no life guard at the end, and we all were shouting  for help. The shop guy was trying to convey something through signs, but was incomprehensible. It was tricky for Dhiren to pull Amar into the kayak, since it was almost likely for both of them to fall into the water again. There was a chaotic traffic jam of kayaks around them with noone being able to help the situation much. Surabhi-Pratik tried to pass the paddle over, it was a task in itself and dicey too.

Then came the Saviours- Vinaya and her husband Prashanth, to whose Kayak Amar held onto. They needed to be steady, balanced and paddle the kayak bearing Amar's one sided weight. Vinaya energized herself by drinking 100 plus, which gave her all the strength and vigour to paddle harder and they travelled a significant distance carrying Amar, which was commendable!. The kayak owners were ridiculously sloppy with regard to rescuing inspite of Amar's agitated screams. Meanwhile, Dhiren returned to the pontoon only to realize that the guy was asking him to get the kayak back so that he could carry Amar on the same Kayak. After all the efforts and arguments, Amar was brought back lying on the kayak, all exhausted and traumatized. 

We resumed kayaking soon after the "rescue operation", and met together in the middle of the reservoir, Surabhi-Pratik directed everyone to align their kayaks together and we took some nice pictures together. Sportive Dhiren joined us back rowing a single seater kayak and throughly enjoying what he wanted right from the  outset. We also tried kayak racing with Priyanka, but realized it was beyond our potential to direct the kayak in a single direction and thus just enjoyed whatever we could! An unexpected spinoff of the kayak capsizing was we all got almost double the time than that was allotted for kayaking!


Drained and famished, we headed straight to Little India and had a hearty Nepalese meal at Everest Kitchen, with starters satiating most of our appetite. The inordinate amount of time taken for serving the orders were filled with discussions and recapitulations of the series of actions and reactions during the kayak capsizing. All the onlookers had their own edited, spiced up versions and speculations as to what caused the kayak to topple. Poor Amar was the scapegoat the entire afternoon, with a few others being targetted and poked fun at for different reasons. Whatever said and done, Amar truly lived upto his name with a near-to-death experience,he believes it was a re-birth for him, which he owed to the pro kayaker couple Vinaya and Prashanth.  

We all thought that this event would not have been so exciting and fun-filled, but for the Kayak toppling. ;)

Cheers to more eventful, thrilling and adventurous outings!

 

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