White water rafting - Ohiopyle, PA

It's been a while since I had been white water rafting and Ramya has always wanted to do it. So, finally just before we are to move to Austin, Pratik put together a trip to Ohiopyle, PA for a bunch of folks to hit some rapids on the Lower Youghiogheny river.

So on the morning of June 14th, 15 of us drove 4 hours to reach Ohiopyle from the DC area. The whole group got ready to check in at 10:30am when we were told that our group's check in time was at noon. Some people were pissed because they had to get up very early in the morning to make it to Ohiopyle in time for the check in only to realize that they could have had some extra sleep on a Saturday morning. In any case, we drove into the small, quaint town down the road and enjoyed some coffee and saw a small waterfall. Just as we were beginning to sign our waiver forms, the skies opened up and started raining like crazy. We got done with the forms and were hoarded in the buses which were to take us to the starting point for our white water rafting adventure. All of us were completely drenched by now. We would have gotten wet on the river in any case so it was no big deal!

The 15 of us were split into 3 groups of 5 each. Me, Ramya, Tatya, Sarah and Pratik were in Group1. Anand, Akki, Mohini, Reema and Gina were Group 2. Esmail, Ashraf, Zubeida, Kapil and Farah were in Group 3. We reached our starting point and were assigned guides. The lead guide walked us through the safety procedures and showed us how to paddle upon our raft guide's instructions. I was the only one in our raft to have had any prior rafting experience. So, I was at the front of the raft. After getting done with the safety procedures, we dragged our raft onto the river and off we went white water rafting.

Our guide Dan was a college kid from WVU. We hit some Class 3 rapids and some beginner Class 4 rapids which were fun. After about an hour and a half on the river, everybody stopped for lunch. After lunch, we hit most of the popular rapids on the river. On one of the rapids, Ramya fell off the raft and into the river. She didn't drift too far away as she managed to hold on to a rope which ran all around the raft. Tatya and me immediately picked her back into the raft by pulling her life jacket. She was scared a bit was it was all fun for her. The highlight of the entire trip was the entire Mahajan clan in the DC area falling off the raft and into the river. But everyone was pulled back into the raft and everybody was OK.

Finally, after covering about 7 miles on the river in just about 4 hours, we reached the end point of our adventure. We got off the river, dragged the raft back to the trailer and got onto our bus. All in all it was a fun adventure trip and a whole group of people could claim to have lost their white water rafting virginity! Thanks to Pratik for putting together the trip.

Here are the pics from the trip taken of Group 1...

Pearl Jam

Our week of concerts was topped by a Pearl Jam show at Verizon Center on the 22nd of July. We figured we had good seats to see PJ but turned out we were in the last row on the upper deck. Bummer! The only consolation was that we could see the band from the top and not from far away in the front. The opening act was Ted Leo and The Pharmacists. Seriously! No one could have cared about this band either as everyone was waiting for Eddie and the boys to come out and belt out a concert that is like no other.

PJ was exceptional this night in DC. The show lasted 2 hours and 45 minutes which is atleast 45 minutes longer than any band would perform. The house lights were turned on 2 hours and 15 minutes into the show indicating that the curfew time was up. PJ couldn't have cared less and they played for 30 more minutes. The highlight of the show for me was Even Flow, Alive, a vintage Black with an extended guitar solo by Mike McCready, Daughter, Elderly Woman and a frantically paced Rearviewmirror. As usual, Eddie used the opportunity of playing in DC to bash George Bush and the oil companies. Not that he needs a reason but still. All in all a great show and I enjoyed this performance better than the last time I saw PJ in 2003. Looking forward to next year when they should be out on the road promoting their next album.

Here's the set list...
Set 1: Hard To Imagine, Severed Hand, Hail Hail, Do The Evolution, Elderly Woman Behind The Counter In A Small Town, Evacuation, Corduroy, I'm Open, I Am Mine, I Got Id, Daughter, Light Years, Even Flow, Green Disease, You Are, U, Who You Are, Why Go

Encore 1: Comatose, Sad, Given To Fly, Come Back, Grievance, Black, Rearviewmirror

Encore 2: No More, Last Kiss, Crazy Mary, Alive, All Along The Watchtower, Yellow Ledbetter

Here are a couple of reviews of the show...
Review 1

Review 2

Here are the pics from the show...

Iron Maiden

Raise the Horns! We went to see Iron Maiden at The Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, MD on the 18th of July. The Gods of Metal put on a tremendous earth shattering show. Bruce didn't seem to have lost any of his vocal pipes for a guy his age. The 3 pronged guitar attack of Dave Murray, Adrian Smith and Janick Gers were fantastic as ever. Nicko McB was his usual force driving the rhythm for the band. And of course, Steve Harris kept the band together with his bass work.

Lauren Harris (yes! Steve's daughter) was the opening act which sucked. But who cared?! Everyone was there to see Iron Maiden and did we ever get a show cranking once "Aces High" started. And the show ended with "Hallowed Be Thy Name" to cap off a magnificent night for us. This was Ramya's first time seeing Maiden and the second time for me. The first time I saw Iron Maiden, me and some buddies were way back on the lawn at the Post. But, this time we had good seats in the house as you can tell from the pics. My head was still reeling from the metal pounding for a good couple of days. Till the next time Maiden visits America... see ya!

The setlist for the show...
01. Intro - Churchill's Speech
02. Aces High
03. 2 Minutes to Midnight
04. Revelations
05. The Trooper
06. Wasted Years
07. The Number of the Beast
08. Caught somewhere in time
09. Rime of the Ancient Mariner
10. Powerslave
11. Heaven Can Wait
12. Can I Play With Madness?
13. Fear of the Dark
14. Run too the Hills
15. Iron Maiden
------------ENCORE---------------
16. Moonchild
17. Hallowed Be Thy Name

Here's a review from the show.

Here are the pics from the show...