A series of posts about things I thought or hoped or feared I would do in 2008.
Of all the things I know I’m not doing this year, not going back to the Grand Canyon disappoints me the most.
When I was 24 and living in Chicago, I read a long article in the Sunday paper about a river rafting trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. It just… seized me. I cut the article out of the paper and put it in my bedroom. Then I wrote to the rafting company and asked for a brochure… it couldn’t hurt to ask, right? The brochure came, along with the pricing list for that year’s trips and next year’s. And I just about cried. I was making extremely little money, and the trip plus airfare plus supplies and expenses was probably in the neighborhood of 10% of my net income for a year. And the thing about living lean is that there’s just not 10% left over, you know?
But I read the article again. And again. And I got stubborn (I do that, sometimes). I instituted the Grand Canyon Invisible Savings program. Every time I got a paycheck, I would deposit it into the bank and then deduct $10 or $20 or whatever I could manage and write it down on a little piece of paper in the back of my checkbook register. Because if I couldn’t see it, I wouldn’t spend it…
But of course, sometimes I needed the money, and then it had to come out of Invisible Savings and back into the Real World. But I just kept reading the article in my wallet, so many times that the paper became soft like an old t-shirt.
About a year later, I had about 70% of the money saved. So I called the company and booked a trip for June. I sent in the deposit. I bought hiking boots and a rain poncho and worked like a demon to scrape together the rest of the trip money before I got on the the plane. I think that when the flight lifted off, I had something like $47 left in my checking account, or some equivalent no-responsible-adult-would-do-this amount.
I flew to Las Vegas. I stayed overnight in a cheap casino/hotel. One of the luxuries I’d budgeted for myself was $50 in betting money, and that evening I gathered my courage, went to the $1-ante blackjack tables, and asked the dealer to teach me how to play. I lost my $50, but I got 4 hours of entertainment and a couple of free drinks out of it. And it made me feel brave. It was the start of my adventure.
They picked us up the next morning and took us in a van to the river, about 25 customers plus three guides. They put us on two ginormous pontoon rafts. And away we went, into the canyon.
It was so beautiful and powerful there. It felt like being home. It was like letting out a long breath that I didn’t know I’d been holding. It was the most enormous quiet I have ever felt in my usually noisy mind. People on the boat thought I was odd because I didn’t want to chat — I didn’t want to compare stories about our jobs and our kids and talk about my favorite TV show. I did want to shriek at the guy who spent the whole first day looking at his watch (his watch!) and saying, Well, back in the office they’re having the marketing meeting about now, ha ha! I get it now — it was his way of letting out his breath — but at the time I just wanted to drown him.
We rode the river for 6 days. We slept on the river bank in the darkest darkness I have ever experienced. The guides cooked incredible meals. Every day there was at least one stop where we could choose to hang out at the river, or follow one of the guides on a side trip — to a spring or down a side canyon or up to a vantage point. We went over some E-ticket rapids.
And at one point deep in the canyon, the walls going so far up above us that the sky was a narrow strip overhead, the boatman pulled our boat over against the canyon wall.
He told us all to touch the wall. And when we did, he told us that the rock under our hands was two billion years old.
So I want to feel that rock again. I want to be on that green river under that blue sky. I want to fill myself up with the place again.
And when I go, I’m going with Arizona River Runners — the same company that took me there 22 years ago. And I hope, I hope that when I am in the boat, when I ride the rapids, when I wake up under the stars, when I touch the rock, that it will still feel like coming home to something about myself that I’ve never found anywhere else.
Goosebumps, Kelley. Even before you touched that wall I realized it was Arizona River Runners. And yesterday I found, and re-read a handful of letters from Lew, long time guide for ARR. And I replayed how a couple of my fire seasons ended, scooting off the mountain to join Owen on the river. He also guided with them for years… Marvellous to be reminded, also, of the path a passenger might have travelled to get to that water. And those clock watchers! ARR trips seemed to specialize in attracting such a mix of mentalities! Really. The guides needed to be psychologists…or shamans. Which they are perhaps…
Wow, is it a small world or what?
The ARR people were incredible. Our guides were two men and a woman — her name was Chris, and the two guys were… I don’t know, Lew sounds like a familiar name but maybe that’s just wishful thinking. Did he guide in ’86.
Psychologists, for sure (at least!). I only realized afterwards what an enormous responsibility it is — because it’s not like someone can just drive down to the riverbank three days into the trip and pick you up, you know? So the guides have to be ready to handle just about anything themselves — nerves, stupidity, assholery, accident, sickness, and (I imagine) several people every summer having Major Life Realizations that completely whack them out… And all with a smile and a sense of humor and complete, constant attention to the river, the beautiful river which could have killed any of us in less than a minute.
ARR rocks. I can’t wait to go back.
I really enjoyed this post. Thanks!
Amy, glad you enjoyed it.
I’ve really been enjoying hearing your stories. Sorry that you’ll be missing out on some of these things. I’ve done a bit of white water canoeing/rafting in my younger days, and you really took me back. I’ve also been thinking about doing a similar trip the last couple of years (but with an all women’s group), and now I’m going to really get it on the must do list. Soon given the state of the Colorado River. It will be interesting to hear what you notice on your next trip down with the low water levels. The way the southwestern states (esp. So Cal and Las Vegas) are sucking up the water in combination with global warming, it is frightening what is happening there.
In my mind there is nothing like that connection with nature you experienced to give us perspective on life and our place in it. Personally I have often felt much more connected all alone out in the wilderness than I do in the city surrounded by people.
Jennifer, yes, I worry too about the river level and what will happen in the future… my dad and stepmother are moving to Las Vegas next week, and I worry that in 10 years there will be no water there…
Maybe Tom can tell us what the river was like from the water level perspective (waves at Tom).
You’re right about the connection… although I didn’t really connect with the people on the boats (I just didn’t want to, apart from anything else, earning me a heartfelt but really annoying lecture from a man in his 60’s about how I Shouldn’t Be Afraid Of Interacting With People). It annoyed me so much, I expect, because I was hoping to find that the canyon was one place where nobody would expect me to be Miss Community. But I sure did connect with the canyon, and that felt like connecting with myself.
I can be very much “a world unto myself” sometimes. That would be part of the reason for returning, for me.
Hi Kelly, wow, can i relate. My partner and i, after 16 years of exploring the southwest, just did a 30 day Lee’s Ferry to South Cove one boat (16 foot raft) trip this Jan-Feb. It was a 300 mile journey through the entire Grand Canyon. Yes, it WAS very cold, but it was the most amazing thing we have ever done together.
The anticipation… The planning… The savings… The packing..
We were lucky and won the do-it-yourself lottery. We then had a year to plan for the journey, save up some $ (our trip cost us a little short of $20 a day, and we ate really well), and our home was FULL of gear as we packed…and we were so amped about the journey…
As a do-it-yourself river runner, I can’t encourage you enough to go boating again. And next time, take an oar powered trip, like the ARR dory trip. You might (understood, some people don’t) find there’s more to Grand Canyon then we ever dreamed.
Hope to meet you on the river some day if we are both so lucky, t
Excuse me, Kelley, for bouncing a “hello” off of your site to Tom Martin. Hi Tom! I just picked up PARK RANGER SEQUEL downtown this morning. Vishnu Temple Press does such great books! Glad to hear you had a great 30-day. Jean (ex-Grand View LO)
Hi Tom,
What a cool trip! Sounds fantastic, and how wonderful for both of you that all your planning and care and anticipation was rewarded so well.
And winning the DIY lottery — well, there’s that serendipity again. Except that of course the luck is only the first part: after that is the will, and the work — and then the adventure and the joy.
Thanks very much for sharing the story.
Jean, no, I don’t mind at all. Bounce away. Community is good.
Hello Jean! Talk about small world!
Those of you who don’t know Jean, she is the Coolest, Most Wonderful person. And, she got to hang out at the Grand View fire lookout tower and report fires while hanging out at one of the most incredable views in the west!
So glad you liked Nancy’s PARK RANGER and PARK RANGER SEQUEL. What’s Amaizing about Nancy is she has SO MANY stories that aren’t in her books, and she’s such a fine person! I’ll pass on to Hazel your best wishes for Vishnu Temple Press. Books are a wonderful thing! So are Blogs! Thanks Kelly, Best to you all, t
Yes, I didn’t mean connecting with the other people on the boat, I meant Connected… to everything — self/earth/humanity. Frankly, I think those people would’ve made me crazy; I don’t think I would’ve been as understanding as you were/are. I avoid those
Seattle to LV – that’s a huge change. I’m thinking it’s time to get out of the southwest – 10-13 years and we’re in big trouble.
Have never been to the GC . . . but touched with the 2 billion y.o. rock. I prefer the quieter waters of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness in N. Minnesota. In many areas you touch on, sleep on, clean fish on rocks that are closer to 3 billion than 2!! Amazing isn’t it? I can never get my mind around it.
As someone that’s lived close the the Great Lakes my entire life I’m simply terrified of what’s to become of them when fresh water really starts to become scarce.