The Comal River is trying to kill me

I love tubing. I try to go once a year. It's becoming painfully obvious that tubing does not love me, however. From now on I'm sticking to the Guadalupe.

The first time I floated the Comal was the summer of 1994, with a HOBY alumni reunion. We rented from the Ole Mill Stream near Landa Park. Everything was going great until we reached the dam at the end of the Prince Solms tube chute. I'd seen several people float over the dam and it looked like a good way to finish the chute experience. Nope. I went over sideways, the waterfall hit the side of my tube, and I capsized to the right, bashing my head against the side of the dam. I nearly lost my sunglasses and was dizzy for about the next half-hour.

My next trip was during the summer of '97. A group of us met in Austin at Sarah and Michelle's apartment in order to caravan to New Braunfels. While I suffered no physical damage this time around, my sense of schedule and organization suffered a great deal. I think about six hours passed from when we first met until we got into the river. During that time we:

• Finally caught up with part the group of Aggies from College Station that said they'd meet us "somewhere along I-35 in San Marcos" rather than choosing a designated rendezvous in advance
• Waited about 20 minutes on a farm-to-market road south of San Marcos for the rest of the Aggies that decided they just had to go outlet shopping that morning
• Sent a recovery party for the part of our group that had decided we were leaving from Gruene rather than the Ole Mill Stream
• Upon their return, sent said party on a search for tubes, as we had taken so long to get together that Ole Mill Stream had run out
• Sent another group on a beer/cooler run

Last weekend, we returned to the river as part of Robyn and Nick's wedding day festivities. Texas Tubes picked all of us up from the hotel, which eliminated most of the problems of the prior trip. Their employees repeatedly warned us not to go over the dam. I needed no extra discouraging. Portaging around the falls went smoothly for me, but Josephine managed to miss her tube completely when re-entering the water. About 30 minutes later, I got out of the water to throw away some trash. Mary Alice had floated ahead about 30 feet, so I thought I'd get a running start at my tube to gain some momentum. Sometime during my half-twist to land in a normal tubing position, I misjudged the distance to my tube and overshot by about a foot. Not too bad, just enough to overbalance, backflip into the water, and smack the back of my head against the rocks at the bottom of the river. The bleeding stopped by the next morning, but I still have a pretty good sized knot up there.

Perhaps the taste of blood has appeased the river gods that are apparently upset with me, but I'm not going to chance it. Odds are they're going for a limb next time.