I jumped in my wooden barrel and headed down the Niagara River to Niagara Falls. Based on history, there is a 50% chance of surviving going over the falls in a barrel – I’ve bet on things less certain than that before, so I thought I’d give it a go.
You’d think the hardest part would be the actual falls, but the hardest part are actually the rapids up the top. It’s hard to keep your barrel straight when you’re getting tossed and turned along the final stretch.
The actual going over is the easy part – you can’t see where the falls start from the top, so there isn’t a chance to have second thoughts at the last minute. It turns out I had timed my run perfectly for the sunset.
There isn’t much to see on the way down… there is too much water.
I got out of the water and dried myself off. By the time I got out it was dark and the lights had been turned on. There are actually two sets of falls at Niagara, one is in Canada and the other in the U.S. I had gone over the Canadian falls (known as the Horse Shoe).
And then the U.S have the American Falls and Bridal Veil Falls (the last waterfall on the right).
I am now one of only a handful of people who have survived a barrel run. My favourite story about others who have done it is:
BOBBY LEACH July 25, 1911
Bobby Leach, an Englishman, successfully made a trip in an all-steel barrel on July 25, 1911, and then spent 23 weeks in hospital recuperating from numerous fractures and other injuries. Fifteen years later on a lecture tour in New Zealand, he slipped on an orange peel, broke his leg and died of complications from the injury.