Windwalker's Mountain Post: River: Into the Grand Canyon, 1

Moving beneath Navaho Bridge as we begin our journey

We have been off the river for nine days. After helicoptering out of the Canyon, Jeanne flew to Las Vegas for her return to Chicago, and Kristi, Lyn, Lee, Pam and I flew back to Lee's Ferry to spend the next day walking on the South Rim. The following day, Lee, Pam, and I returned to our homes in Little Valley.

With pictures and experiences crowding my heart and my head, I was again baffled by how to unpack and tell the story of the time we spent on the river. Part of me was tangled up enough to think this might be a trip I would not be able to tell about in any coherent way. The magnitude of what we saw and experienced seems too great for words or images. What I have are feelings. How to start? Where to start? Do something mechanical…so I began by unloading my cameras into my computer. Then, I put together a musical sound track so that as I began to work the pictures I could listen to the music. The combination brought feelings and experiences surging up out of my heart into my senses.

I reread part of the book, Writing Down the River which had opened me to the experience prior to our departure. I began with a chapter written by Denise Chavez. Gently, her words, the music, and my own images opened me once again, and I began to write. At first, there was no particular order to my reflections. But happy I was just to have them coming out into my journal--sometimes at the speed of water falling over rapids, sometimes slowly, softly like gliding over calm water in the morning or late afternoon What I offer here will be a series of reflections and recollections of this incredible, seven day journey down the Colorado River into the Grand Canyon.

Now, I have experiences to understand what John Wesley Powell meant when he wrote:
The wonders of the Grand Canyon cannot be adequately represented in symbols of speech, nor by speech itself. The resources of the graphic art are taxed beyond their powers in attempting to portray its features. Language and illustration combined must fail.

However, having traveled 187 miles of this river, I want to recall, relive, and represent our experiences in the only ways available to me. I invite you to come along for as much or as little of the journey as pleases you.

At 7:30 a.m. we wait, along with 15 or 20 other people at a small landing strip. When the plane from Las Vegas appears as a dot on the horizon, we all laugh and point as several among us called out, "Da Plane! Da Plane!" Aboard was the last member of our small group of six: Kristi and Lyn, Lee, and Pam, and me from Little Valley. Jeanne, picking up her back pack from the tarmac, is a teaching friend from Illinois. We will be joined on our seven day journey by twelve of the group anxiously clustered under a small sun shelter at the end of the air strip. Now, both the group going out for six days, and our seven day group board vans and head for Lee's Ferry where the rafts await.

After instructions about how and what to load into our dry bags, how and what to load into our day bags, how to clip our water bottles to the boat, how to adjust and wear (at all times when you are on the boat) our life jackets, our group finally loads onto our boat--a J-Rig so named by Jack somebody who designed the boats to carry 24 passengers, crew, and gear and run the fierce waters of this canyon. As we glide slowly down the river toward Navaho Bridge, I, like Denise Chavez who made this trip so many years before me, catch myself holding my breath. “When I am able to finally gather myself, I slowly breathe in and out. I remember Thich Nhat Hanh's words: ‘Breathing in I calm myself, breathing out I smile’.” I begin to relax. Chavez recalls sage advice from her sister, “Abandon yourself to the water. It's all about letting go.” And so I do--let go.

For the next seven days I think of nothing except this river, this canyon, these people, the here and now. I am here, fully present, opening to whatever awaits us. Once again, the words of Powell foreshadow what lies ahead: “The glories and the beauties of form, color, and sound unite in the Grand Canyon - forms unrivaled even by the mountains, colors that vie with sunsets, and sounds that span the diapason from tempest to tinkling raindrop, from cataract to bubbling fountain...The elements that unite to make the Grand Canyon the most sublime spectacle in nature are multifarious and exceedingly diverse.”

As we glide quietly into this adventure, our guides give us a bit of information about the river's many ancestors: John D. Lee, ferry operator executed by hanging for the Mountain Meadow Massacre. Frank M. Brown, drowned surveying for a railroad that was never built. Pete Hansbrough, drowned five days after Brown, survey crew member who inscribed notice of Brown's death in stone on the canyon wall at mile 12. One hundred twenty eight passengers killed in a two airplane collision over the canyon, June 30, 1956...parts of the plane's fuselage still visible where it came to rest, jammed in a crack high on the canyon wall. Other parts and pieces of its cargo, crew, and passengers forever entombed in the rubble of canyon walls and detritus.
Mother be gentle with them all...murmurs Chavez in my head.

The river is unpredictable and strong, beautiful and beckoning, "Come, around this next corner, this next bend, over this next rapid, riffle, smooth water and see what I can show you." Water be gentle with us. "The…days [will] pass full of wonder, indescribable joy, broken now and again with sudden [drops and rapids]...I am overwhelmed by the smallness and fragility of our raft in this very vast space." (Chavez)

Powell himself was in awe of the canyon and waters he set out to explore.
We are three quarters of a mile in the depths of the earth, and the great river shrinks into insignificance, as it dashes its angry waves agains the walls and cliffs, that rise to the world above; they are but puny ripples, and we are but pygmies, running up and down the sands, or lost among the boulders. We have an unknown distance yet to run; an unknown river yet to explore. What falls there are, we know not; what rocks beset the channel, we know not; what walls rise over the river, we know not.

And even though the river and canyon is unknown to the travelers on this boat, I am in constant awe of our guides who do know. They bring us safely through each obstacle and rapid. They steer us into calm waters that reflect canyon walls and morning shadows. They steer us down the twists and turns of the canyon, pointing out bright angel shale, pink granite, black schist, and limestone. Every evening they find us a safe home. In between all of this magic they tell us stories and history, give geology lessons, fix breakfast, snacks, lunch, and fabulous dinners. They make us comfortable peeing in the river, queuing up to use the toilet (which they also set up and take at least once a day, sometimes twice), and bathing in the open in the frigid waters of the river--each evening a cleansing blessing that leaves us breathless but glowing with a sense of scoured well being.