Ski bourse!
While it has been snowing heavily upon the mountains in Annecy we were not so lucky and all we ended up with was rain. Something that I have actually been missing from Ireland! Although after recent news I'm not sure how I feel about it anymore.
If you look closely you can see the snow on the mountains!
Since I started kayaking in first year in university the idea that whenever it rains means kayaking has been ingrained into me. You get to do the harder rivers and all the moderate ones get harder the more and more rain there is, which is all great fun, until that is it all goes wrong.
On the 14th of November Shane Murphy from Dublin, Baldoyle died while kayaking one of these hard rivers. I can't imagine the effect that had on the people around him but it hit me pretty hard, were weren't close but it still felt incredibly sad how alike we were and how easily it could have been me. I knew he from the skate park in Donaghmede, though we rarely talked we would always give each other a little clap by banging the tail of our boards on the ground when one of us got a trick we had been trying for a while, a kind of recognition.
The thought of having to drag my dead friends body from the river and perform cpr until the ambulance comes is what my nightmares are made of. Another kayaker also died that day, Juanito de Ugarte from Peru so clearly the river gods were not happy that day! But it just shows how suddenly life can change.
I usually write on friends facebook pages for their birthdays is well done you're old as a joke, but recently I think I have started to understand what birthdays are actually for.
There is no doubt that I have matured since arriving in France and I think this is the biggest thing that has changed for me.
To finish off on a happy note here is a video I made about a trip I did to Slovenia with my university kayak club. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpCdIpANVCI
Adiós, Éanna.
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