I basically thought I'd be doomed come river time. I caught on pretty quickly in the next two sessions though. The real keys are being relaxed and being balanced. The trouble with being relaxed is, well its not a normal reaction to things your bad at. From what I understand this makes kayaking yet another sport that women tend to learn faster than men.
Men try to overpower the boat, big mistake, while women let things take their natural course.
We also learned the eskimo rescue, a technique by which you can right yourself, once capsized, by using the boat of a fellow kayaker. Finally we learned how to roll. Amazingly, I was a rolling fiend in the pool sessions. Our trip took place on the Mackenzie river, about 45 minutes east of Eugene up in the Cascades. To be honest it was a pretty ugly day, overcast and cold, I don't think the high was much over 50, and there was a chance of rain.