On the Sunday after the conference was over, Cara Summers, Brenda Chin, Stephanie Bond and I drove up to Tennessee to raft the upper and middle Ocoee. We all agreed it was the best whitewater rafting we’d ever done. Talk about a rush shooting back-to-back class IV and V rapids — you make it through the first one and then the guide is yelling, “Dig in, dig in, paddle hard” and you know you’re hitting the one with the big, bad hydraulic. None of us went out of the boat which is always a relief so we were none the worse for wear except for helmet-hair after 5 1/2 hours. And the bonus was our guide was none other than Rita Herron’s son.
