Timber! Logging Our Backyard, A Shredded Hammock and Other Recent Happenings…

September 16, 2019 / Curt Mekemson / 36 Comments

I never expected to see a logging truck coming down our road but thanks to drought brought on by global warming, we had 43 trees to remove!

It’s time for a quick break from my Highway 395 series to bring you up to date on current events in our never-boring life such as a logging operation in our backyard. I’ll be back to Highway 395 and Virginia City in my next post. A note on photos: Peggy and I shared photographer’s duties on this post.

Removing 43 Douglas firs from our five acres was not anything Peggy and I looked forward to, either from an aesthetic or financial perspective. Global warming didn’t give us a choice. Severe drought weakened a number of our trees and voracious pine beetles took quick advantage of the situation. We decided to be proactive in hopes of slowing down or stopping the beetles.

I am no stranger to logging operations. My father was the electrician for a lumber mill when I was growing up. We considered the mill with its logging pond as part of our extended play area, much to the dismay of the nighttime and weekend watchman. He had an extensive vocabulary of swear words that he liked to share with us. We even had a logger with his logging truck living next door. He’d wake us up at 5:00 a.m. on summer mornings as he dashed off to collect his first load of logs. Since then, my backpacking trips have occasionally taken me through areas that were being logged.

None of this is anything like having a logging operation in your backyard, however. I didn’t actually hear anyone shouting “Timber!” but the buzzing sound of chainsaws accompanied by the crashing sounds of large Douglas firs (some over a hundred feet in length) was our constant companion for a week.

Peggy hiked up and took photos of the logs being hauled out of the forest…

We watched as the logs stacked up in our backyard.

And then were loaded onto a truck. (There were two loads.) Check out the claw!

This large claw, designed to grasp logs and load them on to the truck, was operated from the front of the truck by the owner, Davron Holland.

We waved goodby to our trees as they were hauled away.

Speaking of claws, all of the commotion disturbed the forest spirits that live in our canyon. Peggy and I came home one day to find our hammock being shredded!

Was it the same creature that left this mark?

It appears that its claws were of an appropriate length. Could it be the legendary Bigfoot?

Not likely. My nephew Jay Dallen and I check out a Bigfoot family at Crater Lake National Park. They hardly seem the type to rip up a hammock… (Jay, you may remember, backpacked a hundred miles with me last summer on my 750 mile trek down the PCT.)

Maybe Bone was having a bad day. My blogging friend, Crystal Truelove, took him up to the Bigfoot trap to show him what it feels like to be locked up. But Bone is good friends with Crystal. She took him back for a visit to the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma this past year and he got to hang out with Cherokee princesses.

Also, he had a photo shoot with Jay’s actress friend, Nichole Tompkins…

This fellow at Crater Lake was a possibility. I refused to feed him a peanut, but a) his claws were too small and b) Nichole shared a PB&J sandwich with him.

This buffalo we found in Al the Wop’s Bar in Locke, California last week had the right horns but his unique eyeshade eliminated him.

This Stellar Jay was unhappy enough to take on the challenge. He was hot! But again, his claws weren’t up to the job.

We found several possible candidates on our road trip through the redwoods where we found the claw marks.

Maybe it was an irritated buck with an attitude problem. This was my prime candidate with his “Are you looking at me!” pose. Turns out, it was a fellow that hangs out with him, a young spike with two small but sharp horns who was suffering from severe antler envy. He was using the hammock to clean the velvet off his antlers.

And Other Events…

My niece Marion and her husband John. They had come out from Tennessee to collect my brother’s 32 foot RV that he had left in my backyard when he passed away. It was big! We were glad to see it go.

Next was a visit from a fellow blogger, Crystal Trulove. As most of you are aware, the friendships that evolve from our blogging are special. Crystal was in town for the Shakespeare Festival in Ashland and stayed at our house. She treated us to the wonderfully whacky play, “Alice in Wonderland.” The African cloth in the background, BTW, was sent to me by another good blogging friend, Linda Leinen at Shoreacres. Linda and I share a common background of having lived in Liberia, West Africa.

We had a delightful visit with Jay and Nichole. Here we are at a Beach Boys Concert at the Britt in Jacksonville, OR.

We took Jay and Nichole to our favorite kayaking spot, the Bigfoot trap, and…

to Crater Lake National Park. Here Peggy and Nichole share a look. (I am not sure it is possible to work more blue into a photo.)

On our way home from Crater Lake, we were treated to this sunset in the Applegate Valley. When Jay and Nichole left, Jay was heading off to film a National Geographic reality adventure show across Russia and Nichole was heading for Barcelona where she has a film opening.

We went on a short road trip through the redwoods. They’re big.

Until the national and state parks were created to save the redwoods, they were rapidly being cut down. My seat is an old stump.

And note the burls! I will be doing a much more extensive post on Redwood National Park (and Crater Lake) as part of my national park series.

We ended up visiting my old friend Tom Lovering who lives on the Sacramento Delta with his friend Lita in the town of Clarksburg. I was backpacking with Tom in 1977 when we found Bone. Tom immediately loaded us into his ski boat to head off for an Italian dinner.

When Tom got the boat up to full throttle, he climbed out of the seat and insisted that I take over, which was a bit scary considering I had never steered a speed boat! Woohoo! “Watch out for big logs,” he told me. Yeah, thanks.

Peggy with Tom’s friend Lita in the back of the boat, not nearly as worried as they should be.

Coming back from the restaurant we were treated to a beautiful Sacramento Delta sunset.

Afterwards, Tom and Lita took us on a tour of the Delta and we ended up at Al the Wops Bar in Locke. You’ve already met the buffalo who lives at the bar.

The deer were also decorated. One can only wonder how many drinks it takes.

If that seems a bit risqué, you can always feed the fish

Or practice the popular pastime of sticking dollars to the ceiling.

The friendly bartender taught me the trick! And, I am proud to report, I succeeded.

Locke when we left the bar. I can count on one hand the number of times I have ‘shut the bar down’ in my life. And I am pretty sure that Tom has been in on all of those occasions.

NEXT POST: I return to my Highway 395 series and visit Virginia City where silver was king and Samuel Clemens adopted the name of Mark Twain.

They Say that Tom Operates with One Oar… Rafting through the Grand Canyon: Part 6

February 26, 2018February 25, 2018 / Curt Mekemson / 27 Comments

We started with an icy cold rapid. Peggy and I are in the first boat with Tom Lovering rowing— just before he lost his oar. (Photo by Don Green)

Day two starts as day one did: early.

Even the birds are sound asleep. Tom argues it’s six a.m., not the five my watch is showing. “Arizona does not honor Daylight Savings Time,” he primly informs us. He’s right. Adjusting my watch adjusts my attitude— a little.

Adding injury to insult, something akin to Folgers has been sewn up in burlap, thrown in boiling water, and called coffee. Oh well, it’s hot, it’s brown, and we have a beautiful day of floating down the Colorado through the Grand Canyon ahead.

For those of you who like facts, here are a few about the river. At its widest point it reaches 750 feet from one bank to the other; at its deepest, it plunges down 90 feet. It flows along at a decent 3-4 mile clip but can speed up to 15 miles per hour in rapids. Since the water comes out of the base of Glen Canyon Dam, it is cold: somewhere around a frigid 46 degrees Fahrenheit during the upper part of our trip. Over the course of our adventure the river will drop 1700 feet in altitude, which is an average 8 feet per mile… 25 times that of the Mississippi River.

Our boatman for the day, Tom Lovering, with his wild, Canyon hairdo.

Bone on edge of Sotar Raft in Grand Canyon

Bone decides that it is time for a photo-op on the Sotar raft in the Grand Canyon. Having learned from his experience on the Amazon River, he quickly moved away from the edge…

And snuggled up with Tom.

Tom is our boatman for the day. He checks to make sure our toenails are painted and then lets us board. The wind is still blowing but it has lost its ferocious bite. A mile down the river we pass Ten Mile Rock, a prominent landmark that has fallen from the cliffs above and now juts up out of the river. Made of Toroweap Sandstone, it was laid down in shallow seas that covered the area some 250 million years ago.

Rafters pass Ten Mile Rock on the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon

Floating by Ten Mile Rock. You wouldn’t have wanted to be near here when this massive chunk of sandstone broke off from the Grand Canyon walls high above the river.

Shortly afterwards we hear our first rapid of the day, Soap Creek. You always hear rapids before you see them; it builds anticipation. Soap Creek roars like a teenage lion. Tom maneuvers through it like the excellent boatman he is but makes sure we get suitably wet. It’s like taking a cold shower outside on a frosty morning with a 15 mile per hour wind blowing.

“I love rowing,” Tom tells us— and it is obvious he does. It is more than the heart-stopping, adrenaline-pumping moments of major rapids where the boatman’s knowledge and skill is matched against the tremendous power of the river with its dangerous rocks and grasping holes. And it is more than the opportunity to enjoy incredible beauty of the Grand Canyon that rowing provides. Tom enjoys the rhythm and the hard work. He even liked the backbreaking challenge of rowing against the wind the day before.

Don Greens ducks along the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon

Nature, like this family of ducks, also adds to the experience of rafting through the Grand Canyon. (Photo by Don Green.)

As do plants and flowers. This is a century plant. (Photo by Don Green.)

Keeping a sharp eye out will reward you with views of canyons within the Canyon. Don’t you want to go exploring?

And almost any view up or down the river is a treat.

At mile 17 we come on our first, and only, major challenge of the day, House Rock Rapid, where we learn another fact about rafting through the Canyon: water levels depend on electricity needs in the West. Peak demands require large releases of water from Glen Canyon Dam to run its huge generators. Eventually, these releases catch up with rafters. The fluctuations in water levels have significant impacts.

House Rock Rapid demonstrates one of the more serious. The river is at its low point. More rocks are exposed and a massive hole lurks downstream from the largest rock. Even the most skilled boatman will be challenged to avoid it. We all land and climb off our boats to scout the rapid. Tom is eager to move on. Steve is adamant about waiting for more water. After a long discussion between the boatmen, a decision is made to take the more cautious approach. All of our boatmen are experienced, and Steve and Tom have been down the river many times. They respect each others opinions. As with most aspects of dealing with natural forces, it is best to error on the side of caution when you have the opportunity. There are plenty of times when you don’t.

Our group worriedly scouts House Rock Rapid. Peggy shows more enthusiasm than may be called for.

We have lunch, take naps, go for walks and watch as three large boats of commercial rafters chug through the rapids with their large engines. It is mid afternoon when the boatmen finally decide that enough water is flowing to reduce the hazard to a barely acceptable risk.

Tom’s fist knocks me on the head when we are halfway through. One of his oars has popped out. I look left and all I can see is churning, raft-eating hole. We are poised on the edge— about to be sucked in! Tom becomes a virtuoso of one-armed madness. Ever so slowly, like about a thousand years, the boat decides to go where he wants. We land, and for one of the few times in his life, my ever-talkative friend is silent.

We looked to the left and saw that we were poised on the edge of a massive hole with a rock in the middle.

The next day, Eggin Stalheim, Dave’s niece, is our boat woman. This is Eggin’s first time rowing a raft and her first time rowing through the Grand Canyon. It would seem insane except Eggin is a world-class kayaker. She is an expert at reading water. The problem is that our large, fully loaded rafts do not move like feather-light kayaks—picture driving an 18-wheel Mack Truck with a Ferrari 458 attitude. We have some adventures.

This shot of Jamie’s raft provides a perspective on what our fully loaded rafts looked like.

Eggin keeps the messy side up, however, as rafters say. (The non-messy side is the smooth bottom of the raft.) So it’s all good. Eggin, like me, has served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in West Africa. When she gets off the river she is heading for Tanzania where she will work with a women’s craft co-op.

Beyond our “kayaking” experience with Eggin, the big news on day three is that we began our side-trips. Almost all journeys down the Canyon include stopping off to see the sights. Some are quite beautiful and others provide unique challenges, as if our daily challenges of negotiating rapids aren’t enough.

Our first stop at mile 29 is the Silver Grotto, which includes both beauty and challenge. Wanting a little downtime and solitude, I opt out and take photos. Peggy tells me, “We climbed an 8 foot wall, repelled down a rock face, slogged through a murky, cold pool and slid down a 20 foot rock slide.” The rock slide was more like free-fall.

As the group disappeared into the Silver grotto, I took some much needed Curt-time.

One of the Grand Canyon’s large ravens stopped by for a chat. Note how the ammunition cans were arranged on the side of the boat. This is so we could have ready access to things we might need during the day: cameras, sun block, snacks, etc.

Raven visits on the Colorado in the Grand Canyon

Having determined that I was harmless, the raven settled in on the captain’s chair. I’m sure it would have preferred that I not be there and that we had left some food unprotected.

I didn’t get a photo of our group members leaping but this is what they slid off of into the muddy water below. Water was splashed on the rock slide from a pool behind the lip to make the slide more smooth. Or so they said.

Next we stopped off at Paradise, as in Vasey’s Paradise. A beautiful waterfall shot out of a redwall cliff and created a Garden of Eden at its base. It was worthy of the name.

The waterfall shooting out of the redwall at Vasey’s Paradise, Mile 32. It’s named after a botanist that was part of John Wesley Powell’s exploration of the Grand Canyon. The water for the falls is made up of ground water that seeps down from above and shoots out of holes in the canyon’s wall.

Dave Stalheim and his niece Eggin perched on a rock at Vasey’s Paradise.

Peggy Mekemson at Vasey's Paradise in the Grand Canyon

Peggy enjoys our rest stop at the falls…

And Jamie retrieves some of the icy fresh water. Whatever work needed to be done, Jamie was always in the middle of it— a good man.

Our final stop of the day is at Redwall Cavern. Major John Wesley Powell was the first non Native American to admire the Cavern’s unique beauty. Powell was a Civil War Veteran who had lost his right arm at Shiloh. His exploratory expedition through the Grand Canyon took place in 1869. Powell thought Redwall Cavern could accommodate up to 50,000 people. Modern estimates are closer to 5000, but it is still big…

Coming around a bend in the Colorado River, we saw our first view of Redwall Cavern.

This photo provides a perspective on the sheer size and beauty of Redwall Cavern.

Redwall Cavern on Colorado River with rafters

As does this photo.

Several folks, including Eggin, took advantage of the river here for a cool dip.

A view of the Grand Canyon looking upriver from the Redwall Cavern for my last photo today. (A note on photos: all pictures are taken by either Peggy or me unless attributed to Don.)

Next Monday in my Grand Canyon series we will visit an ancient Anasazi storage facility high on the cliffs above the river and play in the beautiful Little Colorado River.

Wednesday’s Photo Essay POST: We begin our journey up the Alaska Highway with beautiful views and abundant wildlife.

FRIDAY’S Blog-A-Book POST: The Woods, a ten minute walk from my childhood home, teach me a love of the wilderness that exists up until today.

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The Ten Questions People Most Frequently Ask Bone… The Interview!

April 12, 2017April 11, 2017 / Curt Mekemson / 41 Comments

Bone has been in many tough situations in his life; he can handle tough questions. Here he rests on top of a saguaro cactus in Arizona looking for border control agents. His lack of official papers, or even a birth certificate, can cause problems at times.

Q: Do you really talk? We’re speaking ethics here, Bone. Blogging is about transparency. That means honesty.

A. Are you crazy? Have you ever heard a bone talk? Of course I don’t talk. I just think out loud.

Q: Curt sometimes refers to you as he. Does this mean you are a male bone?

A. No. He makes assumptions, lot of them. He was showing me to a biologist at a writers’ conference and she suggested I have my DNA tested. “Just cut a small chip off of it,” she said nonchalantly. “You can determine its sex and breed.”

“Just cut a small chip off of it!” Outrageous! I am not some it to have chips cut out of. Besides, I lead a rich fantasy life and have no desire to know whether I am male or female. Call me she, he, or Bone, but never it.

Um, I think Bone is definitely a male in this photo. –Curt

Q: You have travelled all over the world and met thousands of people. How do they usually react to you?

A. With befuddlement. You should have seen the look on the face of the customs agent in New Zealand who tried to seize me as ‘animal matter.’ But emotions run the gamut. There was a Japanese man who got off a tour bus at Yellowstone National Park and wanted to hold me for good luck. Soon there were 40 other Japanese handing me around, oohing, and taking photos. I was thrilled. On the opposite side, I know a woman who refuses to touch me, like I have cooties. “I don’t know where Bone has been,” she states primly. Not surprisingly, there is also jealousy. “I want to be you and travel the world,” a good friend in Sacramento told me.

Some people act like I have cooties. This woman almost dropped me and then washed her hands! –Bone

Her daughter, on the other hand, so to speak, understands proper bone etiquette and respect. –Bone

Q: What is your favorite thing to do?

A. Visit graveyards; there are lots of old bones there. My favorite grave is Smokey Bear’s in Capitan, New Mexico. I once stood on his tombstone for ten minutes trying to communicate but all I could get was something about ‘growling and a prowling and a sniffing the air.’ A close second is the grave of Calamity Jane in Deadwood, South Dakota. What a woman! These are difficult choices, though, when you toss in the likes of Hemingway, Daniel Boone and Billy the Kid. On the light side I once visited Ben and Jerry’s graveyard of discarded ice cream flavors in Vermont. My spookiest experience was a visit to the Capela dos Ossos, the Chapel of Bones, in Evora, Portugal. Those folks definitely have a skeleton in their closet, lots of them.

Bone has a special fondness for unusual graves. Here he hangs out with Billy the Kid in New Mexico. Has he been in a shoot out? Is that blood on his vest?

Q: So, what’s your second most favorite?

A. Too hard; I am a dilettante dabbler, but here are a few.

Wandering, of course, anywhere and everywhere and by all modes: bikes, kayaks, rafts, skis, backpacks, sailboats, planes, helicopters, trains, cars, RVs, etc.
Visiting wild, remote and beautiful natural areas. I started life wandering the Sierra Nevada Mountains, John Muir’s Range of Light.
Seeking out the strange such as ghosts and aliens (I’ve been to Roswell four times).
Attending unique events like Burning Man but I also have a fondness for any type of fair.
Meeting weird people like Tom.

Bone backpacking on the John Muir Trail.

Tom being eaten by a bony desert monster.

Q: Speaking of Tom, he and Curt ‘discovered’ you in 1977 and you have wandered extensively with both. Which do you like best?

A. Eeyore, the jackass who can’t keep track of his tail. We’re traveling companions and he saved me from being strung up and buried on Boothill in Tombstone Arizona. I’d robbed a bank, cheated at cards and hung out with women of questionable character. (This is what I mean by having a rich fantasy life. It’s also known as evasion.)

“I was in deep trouble in Tombstone. Wyatt Earp had arrested me for robbing a bank and Doc Holiday was checking me for weapons.

My life as Bone was in serious jeopardy.

Odds were I was going to end up on Boothill, along with Billy Clanton.

But then the ever brave Eeyore came to my rescue! I hopped on his back and we went riding off into the sunset while leaping over large rocks.

Q: Which of your journeys has been most memorable?

A. I would have to say traveling the length of Africa in the back of a truck from the Sahara Desert in the north to Cape Town in the south. Almost falling off the back of a riverboat into a piranha infested section of the Amazon River would have to be a close second. I was perched on the back railing doing a photo shoot. And then, of course, there was the 10,000-mile bike trip.

Bone on photo shoot barely escapes falling off the edge into the Piranha infested waters of the Amazon. “I was falling off when Curt leapt across the boat and grabbed me.”

“I was much smarter when I rafted down the Colorado. I wore a life jacket!”

“That didn’t protect me from pirates. The dreaded pirate Steve held a knife to my throat and demanded to know where I buried my treasure.”

Q: You are often seen scrambling over rocks in remote sections of the Southwestern United States. What’s that all about?

A. I’ve developed a fondness for Native American Rock art. It resonates with my bone-like nature. It’s also another excuse to go wandering around in the outdoors. Plus, some those places might be haunted and it is a great place to look for UFOs. Some of the petroglyphs look amazingly like aliens. Finally, wandering in the desert is known to be good for the soul. Ask the Prophets of yore.

How can this guy and his strange dog not be aliens?

Here I am making tracks across White Sands National Monument in New Mexico. It’s a great place to watch out for UFOs.

Q: Ah, being a born-again bone, do you have any insights into the great unknown?

A. Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Q: Finally, and this may be a little sensitive, but do you always run around naked?

A. What kind of a question is that? Do you think I am uncivilized? For shame. I am the epitome of haute couture! A bow and arrow toting, card-carrying NRA member in Montana has designed and made me two leather vests. What’s more, an 80 plus year old woman in Kansas going on 20 with a crush on Johnny Depp and a room devoted to the Egyptian gods has made me a kilt and several other outfits. Then there is the horse woman actress in Ohio whose husband is an ex-secret service agent who has promised me an outfit and the artist head of a PR firm in the Bahamas who has promised me another. Face it; I am hot stuff, clothed or naked. I may take up a modeling career.

Rod Hilton fashions a new leather vest for bone.

My Bahamian/Canadian friend makes me a new vest in the wilds of Montana. –Bone

Bone, wearing his newly made kilt, fights off a ferocious sea monster in a scene straight out of ‘Pirates of the Caribbean.’

So… now you have heard from Bone, do you have any questions you would like to ask him? He promises to answer.

NEXT BLOGS:

Friday: The stunning temples of Burning Man.

Monday: Bandon by the Sea. It’s back to the Oregon Coast.

Wednesday: The exciting tale of how Bone was rescued from a life of quiet contemplation. Part I

It’s 4 AM and a Bear Is Standing on Top of Me… A Sierra Trek Tale

January 31, 2017January 28, 2017 / Curt Mekemson / 47 Comments

Black Bears are much smaller than either brown or grizzly bears, but this doesn’t mean they aren’t scary. This one was cruising our neighborhood in Oregon and tipped over the heavy Webber Grill on our porch. Our daughter, Tasha, was sleeping in the bedroom next to the grill. “Curtis!” she screamed. Later, our neighbor captured the bear’s photo on a surveillance camera.

I’ve been re-blogging older posts while my laptop is at the doctors with memory problems. Today it’s time for another Sierra Trek Tale. Next week, I’ll get back to the first Sierra Trek but today we are jumping ahead five years to the first trek I led into the back country of Yosemite where bears rule.

Bears like me, or at least they haven’t eaten me. They’ve had numerous opportunities over the years. It goes with the territory of backpacking throughout North America for over four decades. My scariest encounters, as it turns out, were also my first.

By the fifth year of the Sierra Trek, I had worked my way southward from Lake Tahoe into Yosemite National Park. Since we were utilizing a new route from Yosemite to Kennedy Meadows, I had to preview it. (Plus it was another excuse to head out into the wilderness and be paid for it.)

My friends Ken Lake and Tom Lovering joined me on the first three days from the Yosemite Valley floor to Tuolumne Meadows. Day one found us climbing several thousand feet out of the Valley and camping above the Little Yosemite Valley. The bears dropped by for a visit on our first night in the Park.

Half Dome, Yosemite. Little Yosemite Valley is on the other side.

After carefully hanging our food bags from a cable provided by the park service and burying the left over fake freeze-dried raspberry cobbler (it was made from apples), we trundled ourselves off to our sleeping bags. The problem was we buried the food a little too close to Lake. I think Tom may have been up to his usual mischief.

The next morning, a very excited Ken asked if we had seen the bears in our camp the previous night. Neither of us had and we attributed his sighting to an overactive imagination. Believe me, if a bear had been digging up food next to my head, my two companions would have known about it, immediately.

Day two was tough. What I hadn’t counted on was the amount of snow still left on the ground. We spent most of out time slipping, sliding and slogging through it. By three in the afternoon, Tom was ready to set up camp right in the middle of a snowfield. Ken and I threatened to leave him with the bears and he committed to another hour. Fortunately, that night was bear free. They would have found little resistance from the three of us.

Eventually, we made it into Tuolumne Meadows where I was faced with another challenge: hiking over 70 miles of snow-covered trails by myself while Ken and Tom returned to Sacramento and work. The journey was fraught with opportunities for breaking a leg, or losing the trail, or being washed away when crossing streams raging with water from melting snow. None of the above was a desirable outcome for someone hiking alone.

Tuolumne Meadows in the summer.

My other option was to return to Sacramento with Ken and Tom, which was not acceptable. I had a week off to wander in the woods and I was going to wander in the woods for a week. I compromised by heading back over the mountains toward Yosemite Valley. My fractured logic concluded that it was better to break a leg and get lost where I had been than where I was going. I also promised myself to be really careful. This included keeping my food from bears.

Hiking out of Tuolumne Meadows took me back around Cathedral Peaks shown here.

The first day was non eventful and the second idyllic. I was exploring new country, doing what I most love to do. As evening approached, I found a delightful campsite on the Cathedral Fork of Echo Creek. Amenities included a babbling brook to put me to sleep, a flat space for my sleeping bag and a great food-hanging tree with the perfectly placed limb. A hot dinner topped off by tea spiced up with a shot of 151-proof rum and I was ready for sleep.

I carefully hung my food bags at the recommended 12 feet off the ground and 9 feet away from the tree trunk and then snuggled down in my sleeping bag. As was my habit at the time, I slept out in the open, only using my tent when rain threatened.

It was somewhere around 4 am and very dark when I awoke with a pressure on my chest. I couldn’t see very far but I didn’t have to. Approximately five inches away from my face was a long black snout sniffing at me. It was filled with grinning teeth and topped off by a pair of beady eyes that were staring at me with a hungry look.

I let out a blood-curdling scream and vacated the premises.

As I flew in one direction, the equally surprised young bear that had been standing on me flew in the other. I don’t even remember getting out of the bag. The next thing I knew I was standing up, yelling and shining my flashlight into the woods where not one, but two pairs of orange eyes were staring back at me. I lost it. Never have so many rocks been hurled with so much vigor in such a short period of time. The bears wisely decided to head off over the mountain.

But the damage was already done. My camp was a disaster area. My carefully hung food was scattered all over the ground with literally every meal torn open and sampled. All I had left was a chunk of cheese and it had one large bear bite out of it. I hid the cheese under a heavy rock.

As a further insult, one of the bears had chomped down on my plastic rum bottle and all of the rum was gone. I couldn’t even drink. With that option eliminated, I policed the area, crawled back in my bag and went back to sleep. When I awoke in the morning it was obvious that the bears had come back into camp to clean up anything they had missed. Once again the previous night’s trash decorated my campsite. At least the bears let me sleep this time. And they had missed my cheese.

So I ate it for breakfast, cleaned the area again, packed up my gear and hiked 18 miles into the Yosemite Valley to resupply. But my week wasn’t over; neither were my bear experiences. And the summer had only begun. (I’ll get back to these stories in the future after I am finished with my series on the first Sierra Trek. You won’t want to miss the time a bear grabbed me by the head.)

NEXT BLOG: A return to my photo series on Burning Man.

On the Road to Burning Man… Along with 70,000 Other People

January 3, 2016January 4, 2016 / Curt Mekemson / 31 Comments

Just a 30 foot robot boy walking his robot dog at Burning Man 2015. The boy holds a flower in his right hand that he raises up to his nose and 'smell.' The endless creativity at Burning Man has brought me back to event time and again over the years.

Just a 30 foot robot boy walking his robot dog at Burning Man 2015. The boy holds a flower in his right hand that he raises up to his nose and ‘smells.’ The endless creativity at Burning Man has brought me back to event time and again over the years.

I’ve been making the trek out to Black Rock City since 2004 and blogging about the experience for the past five years. Today marks the beginning of my series on the 2015 Burning Man event (along with more general stories). I’ve waited until now because January and February are the primary months when people will make their decisions about going in 2106 and begin to scramble for tickets.

Newbies, or Virgins as they are known on the Playa, are now scrambling around for every scrap of information they can find. Veteran Burners are thinking fondly of past years, or rambling on about the good old days— back when the Man was young and wild, back before he became an international icon and media darling, and back before Silicon Valley giants, Hollywood Stars, and other one-percenters started landing on the Black Rock Desert in their private planes.

If you’ve read my past blogs on Burning Man, you know that I am a big fan of the event, particularly of the art and creativity it generates. But I don’t make the decision to go lightly. Getting there can be expensive and cleaning up afterwards is always a chore. I can live with these challenges, however; they come with the territory. It’s obtaining a ticket that drives me wacko. BMO, the Burning Man Organization, has yet to figure out a way to make the experience painless or even fair. The challenge is that there are a lot more people who want to go than the 70,000 Bureau of Land Management limit.

I blogged last year about my Kafkaesque experience in trying to get tickets. I only ended up going because of the persistence of my friends Tom Lovering and Don Green. Tom found two tickets and a vehicle pass that weren’t outrageously priced (scalped) on Craig’s List the day before the event. Don made an hour trip from his home in Lafayette California to South San Francisco with a thousand dollars cash in his pocket to meet a guy he had never met at a Starbuck’s he had never been to— at midnight.

I had one day to get ready. Food for eight days had to be purchased, 40 gallons of water loaded, the van and bike prepped, baby wipes packed, and a load of gear ranging from goggles to costumes gathered up from numerous places around the house. Because Peggy had just returned from touring Cotswolds in England, she opted out of Burning Man. It was all about me. I scrambled.

Late-morning on Saturday found me waving goodbye to my best buddy. I was on the road to Burning Man! People come from all over the world to attend the event. Some travel thousands of miles. My trip is a mere 300, a short journey of around six hours. From Medford, I cut across the Cascade Mountains to Klamath Falls and then travelled southeast to Alturas in the remote northeast corner of California, cowboy country. I then crossed the Warner Mountains to the town of Cedarville, a small enclave that sits on the edge of the vast and lonely Nevada desert of the Great Basin. It is the final jumping off point for most Burners travelling to Burning Man from the Northwest US and western Canada.

Businesses along the route to Burning Man have learned that Burners are are a potential source of income. Pappy Gander's Restaurant in the small town of Merrill has a Burners welcome sign.

Businesses along the route to Burning Man have learned that Burners are a potential source of income. Pappy Gander’s Restaurant in the small town of Merrill, Oregon has a Burners Welcome sign.

I stopped for lunch and was amused to find this 'duck decoy' painting.

I stopped for lunch at Pappy’s and was amused to find this ‘duck decoy’ painting. BTW, that’s a mallard holding the shotgun.

I opted to spend the night at Cedarville, as I usually do. I prefer arriving at Burning Man during the day. Plus I like Cedarville. The folks in the small town welcome Burners with open arms. (We’re an important part of their local economy. A gas station owner once told me he obtains 50% of his annual income during Burning Man week.) An even better reason for staying was the Modoc County District Fair was underway, and I love county fairs. I parked Quivera (our van) next to the small town park where I planned to spend the night. I asked some folks coming out of a local church if the local sheriff would hassle me. “Hopefully he has better things to do with his time,” a man told me. “If he does bother you, just drive around the corner,” his wife added.

I quickly walked the two blocks to the fair entrance where I paid three bucks to get in. It would be hard to imagine a better use of my money. A three-person band was playing Pistol Packing Mama and other country-western classics in a free outdoor concert. I sat down on a wooden bench and listened. Pigs, goats and sheep greeted me at the animal barns. I wandered around looking at kids’ art, prized vegetables and other treasures that fill county fairs. I even said hi to Smokey the Bear before I returned to Quivera. I went to sleep to the sound of stock cars roaring around in the Annual Mud Race. It would prepare me for the nightly noise of Burning Man.

A horse came galloping across a pasture to greet me as I walked to the fair and gave me the eye. If I understand horse language correctly, it asked, “You wouldn’t happen to have a carrot in your pocket, would you?”

I sat under this attractive cover as I listened to Pistol Packing Momma. The barren looking mountain in the background is part of the Warner Range.

Goats have always been one of my top reasons for visiting county fairs. This fellow was very curious about my camera. Shortly afterwards he tries to nibble on my shirt.

Goats have always been one of my top reasons for visiting county fairs. This fellow was very curious about my camera. Shortly afterwards he tried to nibble on my shirt.

Pigs are also a major reason I visit fairs. I like to arrive when they are eating but missed this time. Still, their curly tails more than justified my visit. You might say they were hamming it up.

I often skip the sheep barn, but how could I resist taking a photo of them all dressed up? They were ready for a fashion runway.

You usually have to go to an Elementary School to find great art like this. I’m serious.

And how about these prize onions? A local farmer probably grew these in her backyard garden.

And finally a challenge. Less you have any doubt that this is horse and cowboy/cowgirl country, how many horses can you find in this collage?

I was up early to make the 80-mile drive across the desert to Gerlach, which is just ten miles from the entrance to Burning Man. Tom had said he and Don should arrive around 8 from Reno. I think they made it by 11. I hung out and watched thousands of Burners pass through town. It took us a couple of hours to make it the last few miles. I was sort of reminded me of being stuck in a LA freeway traffic jam. Almost.

Once you leave Cedarville and a couple of other even much smaller towns, this is the kind of country you see on the way to Burning Man.

For 50 weeks out of the year, Gerlach is a quiet town with about as much action as you see in this photo.

For one week out of the year, however, its streets are packed with Burners and thousands of vehicles pass through the town.

For one week out of the year, however, its streets are packed with Burners and thousands of vehicles of all types, sizes and shapes pass through the town. As the sign notes, Gerlach is the last chance to pick up any vital supplies, such as beer or water.

A large Bazaar (for Gerlach) is placed on the edge of town to supply almost anything a Burner might need, including…

Fine used bikes ideal for traveling across the dusty playa…

And the latest in Playa wear.

So let's say you reduce the number of RVs and bikes, put down pavement, and eliminate the dust storm, couldn't this resemble a traffic jam on an LA freeway.

So let’s say you reduce the number of RVs and bikes, put down pavement, and eliminate the dust storm, couldn’t this resemble a traffic jam on a LA freeway?

And then the dust storm hits. You can barely see the car in front of you. Can you imagine what might happen on that same LA freeway? In an hour or so we might even make the last three miles into Black Rock City.

NEXT BLOG: We arrive in Burning Man and I introduce the 2015 theme: A Carnival of Mirrors. Welcome to the circus.

The Story of How Bone Was Found… Reblog

August 25, 2014January 24, 2015 / Curt Mekemson / 6 Comments

While Peggy and I are at Burning Man, I am reposting the story of how Bone was found. This is the first of the series. I will respond to comments when I return from Burning Man.

Backpacking in the Desolation Wilderness… Or, How to Forget You Are Being Divorced

It was the summer of 1977 and my wife JoAnn was divorcing me. Apparently I lacked in stability or at least in the desire to pursue the Great American Dream. She was right of course. I had absolutely zero desire to tie myself to an eight-hour a day job and a large house in the suburbs. None of this made the divorce easy. I was prepared to spend my life as a happily married man.

To keep my mind occupied, I was working on the route for the Fourth Annual Sierra Trek, a challenging nine-day 100-mile backpack trip in the Sierra Nevada Mountains that I had created as a pledge-based fund-raiser for the American Lung Association in Sacramento.

“So what’s your problem?” my friend Tom Lovering asked over a beer at the Fox and Goose Restaurant. He’d been-there-done-that with divorce and dated a number of women since. Tom owned Alpine West, an outdoor/wilderness store in Sacramento, and sponsored the Sierra Trek.

I had persuaded him to go backpacking with me for six days to preview part of the new route. Our plan was to start near Meek’s Bay, Lake Tahoe and work our way southward 70 miles following the Tahoe-Yosemite Trail.

Tom had invited his girlfriend, Lynn, and Lynn was bringing along her friend Terry. Terry was nice, not my type.

“I have a friend named April who wants to go backpacking,” Tom offered. “Why don’t I invite her to go as well? Maybe you two will hit if off.”

The implication was that this would help me get over my wife. Actually, I had already met the woman who was going to help me recover but I humored Tom.

A friend drove the five of us up to Meeks Bay. April was gorgeous and Tom was right. I followed her long legs and short shorts up the trail. My gloomy focus on the Soon-to-Be-Ex faded like a teenager’s blue jeans.

Hot feet and screaming fat cells were even more potent in forcing me to live, or at least suffer, in the moment. As usual I’d done nothing to physically prepare for the first backpack trip of the year and I was paying the price.

We climbed a thousand feet and traveled six miles to reach our first night’s destination at Stony Ridge Lake. I crashed while Tom broke out some exotic concoction of potent alcohol.

After consuming enough of his ‘medicine’ to persuade my fat cells they had found Nirvana, I fired up my trusty Svea stove and started cooking our freeze-dried dinner. It wasn’t hard. Boil water, throw in noodles, add a packet of mystery ingredients, stir for ten minutes and pray that whatever you have created is edible. That night it didn’t matter.

Afterwards, we headed for our beds. The next day would be long. I slid into my down filled mummy bag and looked up at what seemed like a million stars. There were no city lights or pollution to block my view and the moon had yet to appear.

I traced an imaginary line from the Big Dipper and found the North Star. It seemed far too faint for its illustrious history. A shooting star briefly captured my attention. Thoughts of divorce, short shorts, the next day’s route, a rock digging into my butt, and sore feet jostled around in my mind for attention.

Sleep finally crept into the bag and captured me.

Next: A pounding heart and a sprained ankle.

Truth Is Beauty: A 55-Foot Tall Woman… Burning Man 2013

September 10, 2013January 24, 2015 / Curt Mekemson / 47 Comments

The sculpture Truth and Beauty at Burning Man 2013.

Truth Is Beauty. This 55 foot tall sculpture was a main attraction at Burning Man 2013– for a good reason.

There are two sets of greeters when you enter the Kingdom of Burning Man. The first are Border Guards. They check your passports, i.e. tickets. Then they ask the usual questions: “Are you carrying anyone else? Do you have a pet on board? Do you have guns?” Trying to sneak someone in can get you banned. Usually someone climbs on board and checks our bathroom. This time, the guy waved us on. We were disguised as middle-class retirees. We could have been someone’s grandparents. Heck, we are someone’s grandparents.

The second set of greeters serve as the Black Rock City equivalent of the Welcome Wagon. They even give you a package of goodies. These folks smile through the worst of dust storms, as do the Border guards. “I can see you are Virgin Burners,” the guy told Peggy. “Actually,” Peggy responded, “This is our tenth year.” There was a moment of silence. “Welcome home,” he recovered. “You are going to love the art this year. The artist who did Bliss three years ago has a new sculpture. It’s incredible.”

That caught our attention. Peggy and I had been blown away by Bliss, a 40-foot sculpture of a female dancer. So we were excited to learn that the same artist, Marco Cochrane from Mill Valley, California, had produced a new sculpture for Burning Man 2013, another colossal female named Truth Is Beauty. After visiting the Man and the Temple (always our first stops at Black Rock City), we cycled over to see the Woman. I’ve capitalized the W because the sculpture deserves it. Truth Is Beauty is 55 feet tall. We were awed. Peggy and I returned to visit several times during the week.

In preparation for today’s blog, I decided to do some research on Marco Cochrane and his art. The first thing that I learned was that Marco and I share a passion for Joseph Campbell. In fact the name for the whole Bliss project, which includes Bliss, Truth Is Beauty, and a third sculpture yet to be done, is taken from a quote by Campbell, which Cochrane has posted on his website:

Follow your bliss and doors will open where none existed.

The original Bliss sculpture from Burning Man 2010 now resides on Treasure Island, San Francisco, where Marco has his studio. The statue weighs 7,000 pounds, is 97% air, and includes 55,000 welds, all done by hand. The internal framework is based on a geodesic structure (thank you Bucky Fuller), and includes 4500 ball joints. The “skin” consists of a steel mesh stretched over the structure and screwed on.

The art at Burning Man can be spectacular, such as this tall, nude woman.

Bliss at Burning Man in 2010.

Marco used the same model, Deja Solis, a six-foot tall singer/dancer from the Bay Area, for both Bliss and Truth Is Beauty. His goal in working with a model is to have her relax, feel safe and be herself. He then works to capture her essence and recreate it in his works of art. His goal is to help us move beyond seeing a woman as an object and see her instead as another human being, a rather large human being.

If you would like to learn more about Cochrane and his projects I would recommend going to his website. There is also an excellent interview by Matador Network. Following are a number of photos designed to capture Truth Is Beauty from different angles and in different lighting conditions. Enjoy.

The toes of the sculpture Truth Is Beauty at Burning Man 2013.

To provide perspective on the size of the statue, these are her toes and my foot. BTW, I wear a size 14 shoe.

Peggy Mekemson standing in front of sculpture Truth Is Beauty at Burning Man 2013.

Peggy provides perspective on Truth Is Beauty’s foot. This photo also provides a good look at the inner construction of the statue.

A side view of the sculpture, Truth Is Beauty by Marco Cochrane at Burning Man 2013.

A side view of the sculpture outlined by the early morning sun.

Camera photography by balloon at Burning Man 2013.

As you might imagine, photography is big at Burning Man. 68,000 people probably means 68,000 cameras. This photographer attached his camera to a large balloon to capture unique perspectives on Truth Is Beauty.

Head shot. (Photo by Peggy Mekemson)

From the ground up, Truth Is Beauty almost becomes abstract.

The magic of night at Burning Man, also applies to the art. Using a series of LED lights inside the statue as well as outside lighting, Truth Is Beauty evolves through a number of almost mystical colors.

Truth Is Beauty at night during Burning Man 2013.

Outside lighting gives the statue a sense of solidness.

Truth Is Beauty lit up by LED lights at Burning Man 2013.

The LED lights give the appearance that the sculpture is filled with stars.

I took the following three photos from the same perspective to show Truth Is Beauty as she changed colors.

Truth is Beauty at night, Burning Man 2013.

Truth Is Beauty one.

Sculpture Truth is Beauty by Marco Cochrane at Burning Man 2013

Truth Is Beauty two.

Truth Is Beauty three.

Our friend Tom Lovering (AKA Adios) from Davis, California has a good eye for capturing unique photos. He was up before the sun to be out on the Playa for these pictures of Truth Is Beauty. I will conclude with these photos.

A properly placed sun provided Truth Is Beauty with a heart. (Photo by Tom Lovering)

Truth Is Beauty photo by Tom Lovering at Burning Man.

The sun outlines Truth Is Beauty’s head and is captured in her arms. (Photo by Tom Lovering.)

If you enjoyed this blog, you might want to check out my top five reasons for going to Burning Man in 2014.

NEXT BLOG: Two very unusual churches at Burning Man.

Rowing House Rock Rapid… with One Oar: Rafting through the Grand Canyon

November 5, 2012January 24, 2015 / Curt Mekemson / 8 Comments

We started with an icy cold rapid. Peggy and I are in the first boat with Tom Lovering rowing. (Photo by Don Green)

Day two starts as day one did: early.

Even the birds are sound asleep. Tom argues it’s six AM, not the five my watch is showing. “Arizona does not honor Daylight Savings Time,” he primly informs us. He’s right. Adjusting my watch adjusts my attitude… a little.

Adding injury to insult, something akin to Folgers has been sewn up in burlap, thrown in boiling water, and called coffee. Oh well, it’s a hot, it’s brown, and we have a beautiful day of floating down the Colorado through the Grand Canyon ahead.

Our boatman for the day, Tom Lovering, with his wild, Canyon hairdo.

Tom is our boatman of the day. He checks to make sure our toenails are painted and then lets us board. The wind is still blowing but it has lost its ferocious bite. A mile down the river we pass Ten Mile Rock, a prominent landmark that has fallen from the cliffs above and now juts up out of the river. Made of Toroweap Sandstone, it was laid down in shallow seas that covered the area some 250 million years ago.

Ten Mile Rock on the Colorado River. I thought it should have a more impressive name.

“I love rowing,” Tom tells us– and it is obvious he does. It is more than the heart-stopping, adrenaline-pumping moments of major rapids where the boatman’s knowledge and skill is matched against the tremendous power of the river with its dangerous rocks and grasping holes. And it is more than the opportunity to enjoy incredible beauty of the Grand Canyon that rowing provides. Tom enjoys the rhythm and the hard work. He even liked the backbreaking challenge of rowing against the wind.

Our group worriedly scouts House Rock Rapid. Peggy shows more enthusiasm than may be called for.

Tom’s fist bonks me on the head when we are halfway through. One of his oars has popped out. I look left and all I can see is churning, raft-eating water. We are poised on the edge of the hole… about to be sucked in. Tom becomes a virtuoso of one-armed madness. Ever so slowly, like about a thousand years, the boat decides to go where he wants. We land, and for one of the few times in his life, my ever-talkative friend is silent.

We looked to the left and saw we were poised on the edge of a massive hole.

The next day, Megan Stalheim, Dave’s niece, is our boat woman. This is Megan’s first time rowing a raft and her first time rowing through the Grand Canyon. It would seem insane except Megan is a world-class kayaker. She is an expert at reading water. The problem is that our large, fully loaded rafts do not move like feather light kayaks… picture driving an 18-wheel Mack Truck with a Ferrari 458 attitude. We have some adventures.

This shot of Jamie’s raft provides a perspective on what our fully loaded rafts looked like.

Megan keeps the messy side up, however, as rafters say. (The non-messy side is the smooth bottom of the raft.) So it’s all good. Megan, like me, has served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in West Africa. When she gets off the river she is heading for Tanzania where she will work with a women’s craft co-op.

Beyond our “kayaking” experience with Megan, the big news on day three is that we began our side-trips. Almost all journeys down the Canyon include stopping off to see the sights. Some are quite beautiful and others provide unique challenges, as if our daily challenges of negotiating rapids aren’t enough.

As the group disappeared into the Silver grotto, I took some much needed Curt-time.

A raven stopped by to visit and checked out the “Captain’s Chair” on Steve Van Dore’s boat. These large birds are one of the primary reasons food needs to be carefully stowed.

I didn’t get a photo of our group members leaping but this is what they leapt off of into the muddy water below. Water was splashed on the rock slide from a pool behind the lip to make the slide more smooth. Or so they said.

Next we stopped off at Paradise, as in Vasey’s Paradise. A beautiful waterfall shoots out of a Redwall cliff and creates a Garden of Eden at it base. It is worthy of the name.

The waterfall shooting out of the Red Wall at Vasey’s Paradise, Mile 32.

Dave Stalheim and his niece Megan perched on a rock at Vasey’s Paradise in the Grand Canyon.

Our final stop of the day is at Red Wall Cavern. Major John Wesley Powell was the first non Native American to admire the Cavern’s unique beauty. Powell was a Civil War Veteran who had lost his right arm at Shiloh. His exploratory expedition through the Grand Canyon took place in 1869. Powell thought Redwall Cavern could accommodate up to 50,000 people. Modern estimates are closer to 5000, but it is still big…

Coming around a bend in the Colorado River, we saw our first view of Redwall Cavern.

This photo provides a perspective on the sheer size and beauty of Redwall Cavern.

A view of the Grand Canyon looking upriver from the Redwall Cavern.

In my next post we visit an ancient Anasazi storage facility high on the cliffs above the river and play in the beautiful Little Colorado River.

A Ton of Food and Homeland Security… Rafting the Grand Canyon

October 23, 2012January 24, 2015 / Curt Mekemson / 4 Comments

Preparation for our 18-day raft trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon quickly taught me that eating was going to be a central part of our adventure. This is the back of my 22-foot travel van after a trip to Safeway in Flagstaff, Arizona.

Great adventures start with the mundane. For example, did you cancel the paper? Common sense (and probably your mother) admonish that devious burglars have nothing better to do than to cruise the streets looking for rolled newspapers in front of your home.

More importantly, what about the cat?

Once upon a time Peggy and I had a cat named Effie. Vacations meant I would carefully measure out twice as much food and water as she could possibly eat or drink and four times the kitty litter she might use. The likelihood of her pooping all over the house was much greater that the likelihood of her starving. As a reward for my thoughtfulness, she would shed enough fur in our absence to fill a dump truck.

Now we have food to worry about. Lots of it. Tom Lovering, the trip leader, his wife Beth and their friend Jamie Wilson arrived in Flagstaff three days in advance of our Colorado River trip. Their car was packed to the brim with empty ammo cans and other watertight boxes waiting to be filled with food and the miscellaneous paraphernalia of river trips.

The Department of Homeland Security delayed their journey at Hoover Dam. The Agency is paranoid about mad bombers. Its normally low sense of humor dropped to zero when the agents saw all the ammo cans. The whole car had to be unpacked.

Tom Lovering, our trip leader, has been running rivers since the 70s. I first met him in 1974 when I persuaded him that his outdoor/wilderness store, Alpine West, should sponsor a hundred mile backpack trip I was organizing for the American Lung Association in Sacramento.

Tom is even more paranoid about food than DHS is about terrorists. In addition to being a highly experienced rafter and trip leader, he’s an old restaurateur who had spent months planning the menu. Each dish has been tested several times and quantities have been measured down to the teaspoon. Recipes are spelled out in minute detail. We will eat gourmet on the trip… or die. The options are clear.

Beth, Peggy and I are dispatched to Sam’s Club with marching orders. We fill seven large shopping carts with food. Think of it this way. There are 16 people going on an 18-day trip and eating three meals a day. This equals 864 individual meals.

When we arrive back at the motel, Tom and Jamie have set up a staging area. Food needs to be organized by meal and day and then stuffed in the appropriate containers. The containers will then be assigned to rafts. It’s important that we know where to find the beer.

We have yet to shop for perishables and more food is coming from Sacramento. Our room, we discover, is to be the recipient of most food. There is barely space to sleep.

Food purchase and storage for an 18-day river adventure depends upon numerous lists. First you have to plan out menus and quantities. Next the food needs to be purchased. Finally it has to be carefully stored so you will find the right food on the right day. Tom’s wife, Beth, was in charge of the lists. (Photo by Don Green)

One of our participants obviously felt that tequila and oranges needed to be stored together.

Our bedroom was packed with food. Personal gear is on the bed.

Food organization took place outside of our motel rooms.

The next day is more relaxed. Other trip members begin to arrive and Peggy and I assume airport shuttle duty. Tom takes time for a makeover into something resembling an English Punk Rocker from the 70s with green and purple hair. Homeland Security was right to be suspicious.

Tom is 50% businessman, 30% adventurer, and 20% character. Or maybe I have the percentages reversed. Here he is having his hair bleached for the trip. You will see the results in future posts.

Next blog: Three days and 39 miles: The Journey Begins.

The morning of the adventure has arrived. Everything we have packed… our food, personal gear and rafts are stuffed into this truck in preparation for our drive to the takeoff point, Lee’s Ferry.

A Grand Adventure… Exploring the Grand Canyon by Raft

October 10, 2012January 24, 2015 / Curt Mekemson / 6 Comments

With Steve at the oars, Peggy and I enter the infamous Lava Rapids on the Colorado River, a perfect ten… that’s 10 as in rapids don’t get any more serious. A few seconds later we disappear under the water. (Photo by Don Green)

Today I begin my series on rafting the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. Since it happened a couple of years ago, I am traveling back in time. In fact I kicked off this blog with the trip, some 181 posts ago.

I never finished the series. Other things happened: like having grandbabies born, going to Burning Man, looking for long dead people (otherwise known as ancestors), etc. So I will start with reposting my early stories so everyone can begin, so to speak, on the same page. (Grin)

This series will encompass more than my trip down the river, however. It is meant to be a celebration of the Grand Canyon, possibly the greatest natural wonder in the world. I have been back to the Canyon repeatedly in a time span that dates back over forty years.

Peggy takes a photo looking down into the Grand Canyon. Three feet forward and she will have a thousand feet to learn to fly.

I have wandered the South and North Rim, camped in all of the Rim campgrounds, and stayed at the magnificent El Tovar Hotel. Once I spent Christmas week at Bright Angel Lodge with a view overlooking the Canyon. I’ve been into the Canyon by mule, on foot and helicopter… as well as raft.

Several times I have explored the inner Canyon on weeklong backpack trips. I will feature one in this series.

Our Grand Canyon river adventure started with a phone call. Tom Lovering left an urgent message. I had to immediately stop whatever I was doing (Peggy and my three-year road trip around North America) 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 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 planned risk taking than thrill seeking. Consequently, I had only been on two real white water rafting trips.

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. “Next time you’ll paddle harder.” Yeah, yeah.

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, Bonnie Holmes.

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 a 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. Every time I have visited the Grand Canyon over the years, I have come away with a feeling of awe and reverence. How could a trip through the Canyon’s inner core be any different?

So please join my friends and me over the next few weeks. I think you’ll enjoy the ride.

Here I am. They actually let me row. It had something to do with the lack of any nearby rapids.

This is how Jamie, one of our experienced boatmen, handled that section of the river.

Here are some of the folks that travelled with us on our 18 day trip down the Canyon. In this photo they have reversed their life preservers to look like giant diapers and are floating down the beautiful little Colorado River, one of many scenic stops along the way. They are about ten feet away from going over a waterfall.