Another early day and another beautiful clear view of the mountain peaks. After a leisurely breakfast and packing we were on the water by nine. We spent most of the day on the water and it was very fun. Lot's of big rapids, fast water, and beautiful valley views. The rapids were as good as any I saw in the Zambezi. We even started to loose people (briefly) out of the raft though I managed to hang on. On one rapid (Boat Eater?) we nearly flipped the boat stern over bow. I'm not sure how we didn't as I was certain we were more than vertical on our way over - but somehow we landed right side up and only lost one person (who was quickly picked up by one of the kayakers).
The highlight of the day was the narrow canyon at Phaliya Sanghu. The entire river is squeezed into a narrow canyon with absolutely vertical cliffs more than two hundred feet high - best of all we jumped out of the rafts and floated through it! There was some minor problems as some little kids threw rocks off the suspension bridge (about fifteen stories up!) but the rocks didn't get anywhere near and they were quickly stopped. There weren't any rapids in the canyon, but it was so striking and beautiful, and the cold water was very relaxing.
After lunch we went through several more rapids and several villages where big groups of kids would wave and shout and a smaller group would race out and try to hang on to the rafts for a few minutes. We ended up on a flat grassy camp site under the village of Bhoteodar next to a small Shiva temple. We finished in mid-afternoon, but I'd gotten way to much sun already so I just spent the rest of the day in the shade finishing my book. Some of the other guys played catch and were quickly joined by some of the village boys. It was pretty amusing to watch the guys teach the kids to throw and catch - it really didn't take long until the kids were the better players. After dinner we sat in the two boats (both had been dragged up tonight) and stayed up relatively late talking.
