White Water Rafting Adventure in CDO: Ain’t this a serious fun?

Dubbed as “The City of Golden Friendship”, Cagayan de Oro City could also be named as “The City of Adventures” because of its river rafting adventure and it is also the main gateway to neighboring adventure parks such as Dahilayan’s Adventure Park.

The Great White Water Rafting. Ain’t this a serious fun?

Well yeah! I recently just experienced the white water rafting in Cagayan De Oro City with my fellow wave mates. Out of the many operating companies of the river rafting, we chose  The Great White Water Tours.

At the Great White Water office before leaving for the adventure.

We took the advanced course which takes 4-5 hours. It is PhP 1,000/head. Once your booking with them has been confirmed, provide them the time they should pick you up. They offer free pick-up anywhere within the city. Like in our case, they picked us up somewhere in Agora Market at around 8AM.

From where they picked us up, they dropped us at their office somewhere in Upper Carmen where we met our three guides and signed a waiver. The waiver basically explains that the company will not be held responsible whatever accidents you may encounter during the activity and so on and so forth.

The guides prepared the Sotar boat, life vest, paddles and the helmet. As a preparation, you also need to wear warmers so to protect your skin from the ultraviolet rays of the sun. I tell you, sunblocks cream will be no effect. Better wear warmers which only cost PhP50.00 each. You will be exposed under the heat of the sun for 4-5 hours. So expect that you’ll get tanned afterwards. lol

At the office, we decided to use my Nikon D5100 to take photos of ourselves. The company will only allow one camera for the whole duration of the activity which is to be used by one of  the guides. Also, they will let you sign a waiver that they will not be responsible if ever something happens to your gadget. You can rent their SLR camera for PhP 1500.00 or their digital camera for PhP1,000.00 So right at their office, the group should decide whether to rent their camera or sacrifice one of the group’s camera. In our case, I unselfishly offered my camera.

Wave X at the start off place, we already wore our helmets and life vest. We are happy.

You need to leave all your things you do not want to get wet in their office. You can leave your slippers. Okay so… Right from their office, it took about 45minutes to get to the place where we should start the river rafting adventure. I don’t know exactly the name of the place but I think it is somewhere in Talakag, Bukidnon. At the start off place, we started to wear our helmets, life vest and warmers. There is a store at the place that sells warmers at PhP 50.00. You can pay it after the adventure.

After the guide oriented us about the safety precautions and how to paddle, we were all excited and ready for the river rafting adventure.

I forgot the names of our tour guides but they were all friendly and professional. They deserved a tip. One of the tour guides gave us safety precautions and showed us how to paddle the boat. From that moment, I learned that the river is what separated Bukidnon and Misamis Oriental. On the right is Bukidnon and on the left is Misamis Oriental. Also he informed us that we will be encountering 21 rapids.

The guide who brought the camera went ahead first. Alone with his kayak, he was so good in paddling and surpassing the rapids. So you can actually trust the company if you let them use your camera.

Our initial arrangement. On this picture, we haven’t encountered any rapids or ripples yet.

There. Serious fun begins.

I don’t know but there is something that makes me laugh whenever we encounter the rapids.

Eating yemas on the raft.

We stopped by a mini waterfall and wet ourselves. This prevents heat stroke.

During the river rafting, someone in the group typically fell off the raft accidentally. This could be quite dangerous since you will be “stone massaged“, you know what I mean? One of my buddies dropped off and it was the second time he dropped. The guide was able to capture how he fell. He was almost got killed in a second but we were all survivors. lol

We hit a large rock.

I did not know how the impact went but Zac accidentally dropped off the raft.

Then we noticed Zac was out of the raft.

Zac’s foot was clipped. John quickly released his foot so Zac can swim comfortably.

On this picture, I really did not know that someone dropped off. As you can see I was laughing all along.

My buddies helped Zac got into the raft. He already got bruises on his knees and feet.

It was a slight traumatic experience for Zac and it all happened in less than 2 minutes.

After that unforgettable experience, that did not stop us to enjoy the adventure. As we paddled on, the tour guides would throw cheesy pick-up line and jokes to us. They could be funny. So the group should also prepare some jokes to throw at them. We passed by some interesting caves, rock formation, poorly designed bridges, huts and houses, etc.

Group Jump!

DM’s solo jump!

It was a great opportunity to be able to bond with my buddies. It was a serious fun indeed. There was never a dull moment in the activity. We truly enjoyed it. The 4-5 hours activity was all worth it, the money we spent was all worth it… everything is all worth it. lol

We just did our white water rafting adventure. We still got happy faces.

The 21 rapids have its own name. They are:

1. Merging
2. Elephant
3. Letter “L”
4. Letter “S”
5. White Mile
6. Cloud 10
7. Five Fingers
8. CDO WWRAS Way
9. I’m Busy
10. Macabundol
11. Twister
12. Kris’ Drop
13. 360 degrees
14. Ka Berni
15. Pasi-unang Dalit
16. Botyuk’s Place
17. Brave’s Way
18. Surprise
19. Kiss The Wall
20. Rodeo
21. Macahumbus

The tour guides will explain why each rapid is named after that. They will entertain you. So I guess that is all for now.

Discover Pure Adrenaline!
Cagayan De Oro’s Longest and Wildest Rafting Tour
The Great White Water
For Bookings and Inquiries:
Call 0917-706-0677 or (088) 851-7856
Visit their website http://www.riverraftingcdo.com