Stuck in the Mud!

See no evil, Speak no evil, Hear no evil... But Claire was evilly splashing us!  LOL

 
    Have you ever wanted to try the army crawl through the mud?  Neither did I, but when presented with the opportunity I tried it anyways.  I must have been crazy.

    Recently, a group of ladies and I took a road trip to ACE Adventure Resort in West Virginia.  This place is awesome because it has so many activities.  We've been there before to do white water rafting on the New River.  They also have a super fun activity lake with all these floating toys, like trampolines and water slides and a zip line that drags you into the water.  When you're tired of climbing on all the inflatable slides and see-saws, sit back and relax on the little beach.   We decided to take a stab at the mud course...


    We woke up Saturday and ate a big breakfast in preparation for the mud obstacle course.  I put on a T Shirt from middle school, my mud colored hiking shorts and an old pair of reeboks.  


    At the beginning of the mud course, the ACE guide splits everyone into two teams.  My group stayed together and we got the mom from a family on the other team.  The other team had a bunch of small athletic kids... never the less we thought we could beat them... Yeah Right! 

Playing in the mud afterwords

   First thing we had to do in the race, was fill a tube with water that had a bunch of holes in it.  I volunteered to be the one that jumps down into the pond to scoop water in a bucket and hand it up to my team.  As I'm watching my team plug the holes with sticks and slowly pour the water in, I realized that the bucket looked like it could hold more water than the tube.  So I filled it all the way up and yelled at my team to dump the entire thing in all at once.  It worked!  


    Next stop we had to slide down a black tube into cold muddy water.  As soon as I hit the water, the temperature shocked me.  So cold! Keep going! OMG...  Then we did the army crawl under beams covered in mesh... My helmet fell over my eyes and I couldn't pop my head up to see where I was going without hitting my head, so I just kept crawling, not knowing when it would end.  My knees were getting caught on pebbles and rocks in the mud, but I was too tired to lift them up and use my feet.  I still have scars from the rocks on this part...


    Next we did over and under on logs laying across the cold muddy water... Under was the worst cause your just trying to avoid getting that water near your mouth at the same time you're trying to move as fast as you can.  At the end of the over/under section there is a narrow slippery log that we need to cross, one at a time.  Only after you cross, can you go into the water and give a hand to your other team mates to get across.  I totally needed help the first time on this.  But later when we went back to take pictures, I did the log all by myself!  Total confidence booster..


    I hated the next obstacle... You have to climb up a slippery 4 foot slide, just to slide back down a slide on the other side into the mud.  It was really hard to run up or pull yourself over... Just too slippery and nothing to hang on to.  So of course, as a team we pushed each other over... resulting in face first dives into the mud on the other side.  Fabulous!  

Annie walking up the wall.. Piece of cake!

    I didn't even try the next obstacle.  You had to jump into a deep pit of muddy water and then climb up a wooden wall with a rope.  Upper arm strength is not me.  The one person in our group to rock the wall, was Annie who goes to climbing walls all the time.  It's tough climbing out of the water up the wall though, cause your feet are wet and it gets slippery.  Another girl in our group slipped while climbing the wall, face planted on the wall and then let go of the rope and slide down into the water.  She was not happy after that!


    Next we jumped through another large pit of mud and then had to cross a creek on a log, with all of us holding hands.  That was harder than doing it on your own and you could only go as fast as your slowest person.  But we made it on the first try, so that was good.  At this point, the kids on the other team are already done with the course.

Me and the first slide into the mud

  After crossing the creek we had to jump into the pond and pull all of us on to a float.  Once we were all on it, we had to dive back into the pond and swim all the way back to the starting line.  It was a long swim, and it turned into a slow back stroke while we all chatted and enjoyed the view of the forest.  


   Once we were all done, we walked back through to take more pictures and play around for a little bit.  We all felt a little bit more comfortable getting dirty at this point and I had a little sense of accomplishment.  After taking plenty of photos, we raced back to our cabin to fight over the showers.  Most of us threw away our shoes completely.  I tried to save the white socks I used, but they still have a orangish hue to this day.  

Going backwards down the slide due to technical difficulties.

   Overall, ACE has a bunch of fun things to do.  I know we'll keep going back and trying new things.  The white water rafting is amazing!  Make time for activity lake.  In general, I always have fun in West Virginia!