National Parks

Rafting the Colorado is a Rapid Learning Experience

/ Curt Mekemson / Leave a comment

What we have to look forward to: the boat eating Lava Rapids on the Colorado River.

Our Grand Canyon adventure started over a year ago. Tom Lovering called with an urgent message. I had to immediately stop whatever I was doing and climb on-line to sign up for the Grand Canyon Colorado River permit lottery. Apparently the permits are hard to obtain, somewhat harder than walking out of a casino with a million dollars.

I am somewhat immune to Tom’s last minute schemes but the charming Peggy who loves water, loves rivers, and loves sunshine immediately jumped on-line and did the necessary clicking. Early the next morning we received an Email from the National Park Service saying we had won. It took me a lot longer to persuade Tom than it did for the NPS people to inform us.

I am not, by nature, a white water man. I put running rapids right up there with dangling on rock cliffs, playing Kamikaze on ski slopes, and riding the latest death-defying roller coaster at Four Flags.  My approach to outdoor adventure is more in the nature of risk taking than thrill seeking. Consequently, I have only had two real white water rafting experiences.

The first was with Tom on the Mokelumne River in California in the 70s. Within five minutes he had dumped us into something known as Dead Man’s Hole. “Paddle!” he screamed. River rats love to give their favorite rapids scary names such as Satan’s Pool and Suicide Bend. They can wax eloquently for hours over the qualities of these death dealing anomalies. Our detour “was a learning experience,” Tom explained as we emptied the water out of the raft and lungs.

My second white water trip was on the Middle Fork of the American River. This time I was travelling with Mark Dubois, his wife Sharon Negri and a friend. Mark, sometimes known as the Gentle Giant, once chained himself to a rock in the bottom of the Stanislaus River to stop the Army Corps of Engineers from flooding the canyon with water. He also co-founded Friends of the River, an organization dedicated to saving the wild rivers of the west.

Our trip was rather mellow up until we came to the large rapid. Mark was having us do such things as close our eyes and lean backwards out of the raft with our hair touching the water so we could ‘listen’ to the river. He’s a spiritual type guy, one with nature. Apparently Nature had rejected me. “Now, Curt,” he directed as we approached the rapid known as Guaranteed to Drown or some other similar name, “I want you to climb out of the raft and float down it.”

“I know, I know,” I groused as I rolled out of the raft into the icy waters. “It’s a learning experience.

And that’s how I classify our trip down the Colorado, a learning experience. But I know it will be more. I’ve visited the Grand Canyon many times over the years and have always come away with a feeling of awe and reverence each time. How could a trip through the Canyon’s inner core be any different?

On Being Squirrelly

/ Curt Mekemson / 3 Comments

(Today marks the beginning a series of blogs related to an 18 day trip Peggy, Bone and I made down the Colorado River in May and June. It starts with us arriving in Flagstaff…)

Bone tries on his Grand Canyon/Colorado River life jacket.

Five squirrels with long tufted ears just went charging past our van… in a row. I think it must be love and Peggy agrees. We speculate a female is leading the boys on a glorious romp. “Catch me if you can!” she giggles. The Albert Squirrels are excited to make babies and perpetuate the race, or species, if you want to be biologically correct. Lust is in their hearts. Or maybe it’s just the guys working out territorial differences.

We are located at a KOA in Flagstaff, Arizona as we prepare for our trip down the Colorado River. It’s a big campground. Everywhere we look men and women wearing yellow shirts are busily preparing for the onslaught of summer tourists. It feels like a beehive, or squirrel’s nest. The camp cook tells us 28 people work here. Jobs are highly specialized. The man who straightens out misplaced rocks stopped by to chat with us this morning.

Yesterday we watched two employees struggle for an hour on laying out the base of Teepee. It had all the flavor of an old Laurel and Hardy film. They kept measuring and remeasuring the angles, first one way and then the other. I expected one to leap up and start chasing the other around camp with a 2×4.

We wonder what the Kachina deities who live in the San Francisco Mountains overlooking our campground think about the squirrelly activity taking place beneath them. There are bunches of them up there, over 300 according to Hopi lore, and each one has a lesson to teach, wisdom to disperse. They come down from their perch in the winter to share their knowledge. I suspect they would have made quick work of the Teepee project.

Peggy and I hike up the mountain following Fat Man’s trail. Of course there is no irony here as we desperately try to beat our bodies into shape for the Canyon trip. The trail’s name suggests this is a gentle start. Instead it takes us straight up into a snowstorm. The Kachinas are rumored to mislead people under such circumstances.

Bone celebrates having received official Coast Guard approval for his PFD (life vest) from LT Tony Lumpkin (Lumpy).

Once they had the mountain to themselves but now they have competition. Technology has arrived. Tower after tower bristling with arrays of tracking, listening and sending devices look out over the sacred lands of the Hopi, Navaho and other Native Americans. It’s hard not to think Big Brother is watching. Or to be disturbed by the towers’ visual intrusion. But their presence means we can get cell phone coverage and climb on the Internet. We are addicted to these modern forms of communication so it is hypocritical to whine, at least too much.

But back to the squirrel theme, Peggy and I are a little squirrely ourselves as we go through our gear and get ready for our grand adventure. I am nervous. This is my first multi-day river trip. What have we gotten ourselves into? Do we have the equipment we need? Will we survive the rapids? What will the people who are joining us be like? What challenges will we face that we are ill prepared for? There are many questions and few answers.

Bone too must get ready. Peggy makes him a bright red life jacket and Lieutenant Tony Lumpkin (Lumpy) of the Coast Guard certifies the life vest is approved for travel down the Colorado.

SPECIAL NOTE: Bone will be travelling at the end of August to the unique event in the remote Nevada Desert known as Burning Man. In preparation for this adventure, I have added a new tale to the story section. If you’ve ever wondered what this modern-day extravaganza is about, check out the story.