From working at office to working our paddles – Rishikesh rafting with work buds

Posted by The Wandering Pen on December 3rd, 2020

I love my job, no doubt. But who can blame me for craving a holiday, huh? Especially since the dates and destination of our annual work trip would be announced at any second. My eyes would light up with every new email notification, hoping it was HR finally breaking our suspense. It was 6:00pm and still, nothing. We were all about to log off and leave, but one final glance at our inboxes and lo and behold – there it was! River rafting in Rishikesh, two weeks later. The entire office erupted with joy. 

When the day arrived, we all boarded buses that would take us from Delhi straight to our Rishikesh rafting spot. We stopped at a dhaba for some lip smacking lunch and reached the spot soon after. All of our previous retreats have been in resorts or hotels, but for the first time, as is typical for most Rishikesh rafting packages, we would spend our nights in tents! We excitedly checked out our riverside accommodation and headed for some games that the operator had organised for us. 

We spent the day enjoying ourselves at the campsite and cherished this much-needed break from our hectic schedule. Come night and we all huddled around the bonfire and sang songs along to the acoustic tunes of our colleague’s guitar. A delicious dinner under the stars and some late-night chats later, we retreated to our tents, dreaming of what more the Rishikesh rafting trip had in store for us. 

The next day, we woke up in the middle of the serene nature and had our morning tea before readying ourselves for the big adventure ahead. We were driven to the start point of our Rishikesh rafting, which was a short drive away from the campsite. There, our instructor handed us our gear and ran us through the safety guidelines. We formed groups of 6 and gave our teams silly nicknames, reminding me of kiddish rivalry from when we were kids. 

We climbed into the wobbly rafts and started paddling against the roaring river. We could see the rapids in the distance, and I could hear my colleagues from the other rafts cheering their team on with whatever name they’d come up for themselves. Soon, we were battling every rapid and tackling the river as it tried to thrash our raft. After two hours of paddling through the ferocious river, we entered calm waters and the instructor allowed us to take a dip and swim in the cool water. We all jumped in and splashed without a worry in the world. It was refreshing to see even some of our sombre seniors enjoying themselves with everyone around. 

Unfortunately, we had to head back soon, but had fun stories about river rafting in Rishikesh that would last us a lifetime. We got out of the river and made our way back to the campsite to freshen up and change out of our soaking clothes. After another night of frolic, we had to depart the next morning. We knew we would miss this mini vacation, but we had ample memories to pull us through till the next one!