In case you were wondering, I'm not always the brightest crayon in the
box. I'm not quite taking the short bus to school; it's just that
occasionally my desire for adventure leads me to do dumb things.
Take today's trip to Cachoeira (= waterfall) da Toca. Other than me
evaluating which surroundings are worth climbing and succumbing to the
absurd concept of paying to visit a waterfall, it's going well enough
initially: pretty rapids, deep pools to wade in, etc. standard
waterfall fare. Then I see a slide. Nah, I don't need to check how
deep the water at the base of this ~5-foot drop is: it's gotta be at
least a few feet, and that's all I really need. It looks deep from
above, and it's at the base of a waterfall, so shouldn't I be safe to
go?
No, not at all: the water's a couple of inches. But I don't realize
this when I try and find it out the hard way. Had it been an inch
higher on my body that I hit, I may have screwed up my left knee more
than it already is. As I land, I instead hit with my tibia, fibia, or
whatever the bone in the front of your leg is called. Second point of
contact's my right elbow. This doesn't hurt nearly as much, but it
doesn't feel too good. I'm not sure if my head just skimmed the water
or hit a rock beneath.
I yell at myself for being dumb and then move on. Basically, I see a
bunch of waterfalls without further injurious incident, taking my bike
partway up a mountain in the middle of the island in the process.
It's getting late enough that I abort my planned trip over said
mountain to the east side of Ilhabela's beaches, but the ride down
400+ meters is so intense that I'm ok with this.
A $5 pizza buffet at which I eat until it all but hurts, surfing the
net, and a painful swell where I hit my leg about wrap up the day.
Waterfalls have forever earned the second part of their names for me.