PVA members discover adaptive water activities
Air Force veteran Tonya Andrews couldn’t stop smiling while learning to sail a Tetra Watercraft sailboat Wednesday during Paralyzed Veterans of America’s (PVA) Grand Teton Outdoor Experience in Jackson, Wyo., and surrounding areas.
The second day of the event took place at the picturesque Palisades Reservoir in Idaho. Following a quick morning yoga session designed to help participants stretch out any sore muscles from the first day’s strenuous adaptive biking activities, participants and caregivers had the chance try out various water sports, including adaptive kayaking, paddle boarding, fishing and sailing.
Andrews, who served from 2002 to 2008 and has multiple sclerosis, had never sailed before and loved learning to control the boat herself after a few lessons from Teton Adaptive Program Director Josh Noteboom. He showed her how to use the Tetra Watercraft’s sip-and-puff mechanism and joystick to set the sail and steer.
“For so long, I wasn’t able to move. I was so sick, I couldn’t do anything,” says the 45-year-old, who lives just outside of Dallas and belongs to the PVA Lone Star Chapter. “And now that I’m able to do it, I mean, PVA just gives you so many opportunities to move and get outside and use what you can of your body, and that’s what I wanted to do.”
She says learning to use the Tetra Watercraft was similar to driving her power wheelchair.
“I think my favorite part of my sailing is when everything kind of clicked,” Andrews says. “Like, all the lessons he [Noteboom] had given me, and like, I was deciding where the boat got to go, like, I got to choose, ‘OK, we’re going to the right or the left or whatever.’ I think once I became the captain, that’s when it was like, ‘Oh, this is awesome.’”
Andrews says this time of the year, the summer heat in Dallas forces her to stay at home more.
“Having events like this where I can leave the heat and come to where it’s more temperate and get outside is a dream come true because I used to be a very outdoorsy person,” she says. “And being housebound stinks. I mean there’s no other way to put it. But to be able to get back out in the sun under the open skies, I mean, that’s irreplaceable.”
Andrews is among a handful of PVA members who applied and were selected to attend the first iteration of the PVA outdoor experience program, which runs through Thursday. She says she looked forward to being around like-minded veterans who wanted to try something new.
“And yeah, it might be challenging,” Andrews says. “We’re going to have our spills and try to figure out how to do these transfers and all this stuff, but darn it, we’re going to do it anyways.”
