Trip Report: Day 0-2

Lee's Ferry

OK, here's the trip report. Sorry it's taken me so long! I'll post a couple of days every week or so.

Day 0

We arrived in Flagstaff and immediately went to Moenkopi Riverworks to see if all the gear that had been shipped arrived. We were greeted by Marilyn, MOE's all round fantastic packer, launcher, office manager, den mother, etc. Marilyn had all our gear organized, and arranged for us to check in early to MOE's River House as everyone had to check out of their hotels by noon. Since everyone had mounds of gear, this would have been a problem if we had to wait until 3pm to check in somewhere else. This is where we started several of our frequent refrains, "Thank God for Marilyn!", "Bless you Marilyn!", "Marilyn is the bomb!" which would be uttered continually throughout the trip.

Brady (in orange) loading up at the MOE Riverhouse.

Moe's Riverhouse is comfortable and large (if not in the swankest neighborhood). It was a great place to layout gear, get organized and be comfortable before leaving the next morning. Brady Black, MOE's owner, spent most of the day hanging out with us, answering questions, providing gear, etc. He's a very laidback, likable guy. Whatever we needed, the response was "no problem". A phone call made, and whatever it was, more ammo cans, drybags, inflatable kayaks,whatever, arrived within a few minutes. I really can't say enough great things about Brady, Marilyn and Moenkopi. They lived up to our high expectations and frequently surpassed them.

After dinner we had a trip meeting, watched the NPS river orientation video and crashed. At 7am, we loaded personal gear and set out for Lee's Ferry. Last stop before leaving Flag was Safeway to get lunch for the ramp.  The drive from Flag to Lee's is about 2.5 hrs through the Navajo reservation. Beautiful, Beautiful, Beautiful.

Wind at the Navajo Bridge. Bill, my husband, and my kids who did GREAT on the trip.

 We arrived at the Navajo Bridge and while walking across my daughter pointed out a man with a tracking antenna and a condor Tshirt. If you've been following this blog, you know what a huge condor fan I am. So, I walked over and asked him if he had seen any condors today. He looks at me, then points at the 2nd bridge directly across from us and said, "Well, how about that one?" Sitting on a bridge strut, right in front of us was one of the ugliest, rarest birds in the world. One of about 280 in existence. It was quite a surreal experience actually seeing one of these giant birds in person.  All in all, we ended up seeing three condors while at the bridge that day. They really put on a show, majestically soaring overhead and periodically landing on the bridge struts across from us. Fantastic! Bucket List #1 already checked off: Condors! 

The other less-than-fantastic thing we noticed on the bridge was how the wind was kicking up, it was only about 10am, and there were already white caps on the clear, green river below. Not what we wanted to see. If this were a movie, this would be the foreshadowing segment for the 2 days to come, but we'll get to that later.





Commercial outfitters at the launch pad

After arriving at Lee's we made quick work of unloading and rigging the rafts with help from Marilyn, Brady and Steve from MOE. The gear was either new or in great condition, and everything was rigged within a few hours. It's best to arrive early at the launch ramp as the commercial trips start arriving to rig in the afternoon and things get crowded. This was also a good idea as it was about 110 degrees by noon. We had a quick lunch in the shade at the picnic tables then we winced as five or six monstrous commercial motor rigs started rigging in the heat. Most of the motorized rigs were absolutely huge and were brought in by 18 wheelers with cranes to lift the massive frames onto the J-rigs. I wouldn't have believed it unless I saw it. The river business is a little different from when I was a guide.







Pulling into the Boatmen's beach just downstream of the launching area.



After the river ranger checked our gear (and this was not as nitpicky as I'd remembered), we retired to the boatmen's camp to hide under the cool umbrellas on the rafts and while away the afternoon. MOE supplied these umbrellas at no charge which was awesome. You really want the big 72 inchers in this heat if you are supplying your own.

Dinner that night was at Marble Canyon Lodge. Quick, easy, decent food and best of all, they'll send a nice air conditioned van to pick you up and return you to the Ferry. Nice!

Several of us hiked up to John Lee's Ranch that afternoon. (The easy way is NOT the road. Follow the trail at the base of the cliff next to the River Ranger's office). It was really cool, with orchards and out buildings. I"m sorry I didn't get a picture, it was really worth the hike, especially if you are interested in GC history.

Lee's backbone in the distance.

The three kayakers, myself, Bill R and Don, decided to paddle across the Lee's Backbone to check out the ridge. Here we remembered to never leave the boats or camp without a water bottle. Even for a minute. Of course, a short hike always turns into a longer exploration. It was crazy hot, and we ended up crazy thirsty. However, we were rewarded with an incredible view of the Ferry as well as the Vermilion Cliffs from the top of the ridge. There's also some beautiful petrified trees that were really cool.  



Day 1

Stevie L, our river leader, all round great boatman and friend battling the wind

We woke to strong wind at the boatmen's beach. Not good. We had planned to camp at Hot Na Na (mile 16.5), and without wind it would have been possible, but looking back, I think it was a tad ambitious even with the high water level (25,000cfs the entire trip/no tidal changes). It was just a little too long a day with a constant strong headwind.





At the first significant rapid, Badger, we decided to scout for three reasons: the high water, we had one green-as-grass boatmen, AND we had three kids along on the trip, and no one wanted them to take a swim.

Scouting Badger

Our Badger runs were acceptable if a little eventful, my husband Bill (a very experienced boatmen/kayaker/guide) caught the edge of the top hole and up the oarrig went, almost dumping our 11 year old daughter in the river. But the fates were with them and the raft didn't flip. The kayakers run was eye opening, we pretty much all looked at each other at the bottom, out of breath with hearts pounding and were happy to be in one piece at the bottom. It was BIG in there. One of our other boatmen, Dan, took a brief swim, but was back at the oars before the end of the rapid. We were impressed - with Dan, our boatmen, our kayakers and mostly the river itself. 25,000 cfs is serious water, especially in a headwind. Sometimes it was blowing so hard the kayakers had trouble taking forward strokes since the top blades would act as sails. Yee Haw!

12.4 Camp

At 3pm, everyone wiped from the constant, strong wind, we decided to camp at 12.4 mile camp instead of Hot Na Na. Setting up camp was quick, and I was delighed to just sit and contemplate the light on the Canyon walls. I was a happy girl to be in the embrace of the Canyon once again. After a great meal, full, happy and exhausted, everyone crashed as soon as it was dark, about 8:45pm.

Day 2

Woke up at 4:30am when the sun appeared. I was disheartened to feel the wind gusting all night and everyone's sleeping bags were completely covered with sand by morning. The wind had yet to relent, and I could tell everyone was resigned to another day of headwind. We broke camp about 7:15am after having "tribal council", our daily trip talk. As trip leader, I would give the break down of the day, what we were doing, where we were hiking etc. Steve would give a river talk, discuss the rapids and remind us about safety. I'll call Bill H our enforcer, he would gently remind everyone to be positive and basically not to bitch. Bill also introduced one of the things our group liked most about our trip, two awards that were to be given out daily. Bill had make these cool necklaces with bones, beads and such to be given for either excellence on the river or excellence in camp. The winner of the daily award would be responsible for giving the next person the award at tribal council the next day. This was a really positive thing for our group and people were really motivated to receive them.

Some of our award winners, Wendy for camp and Mike for River!

So, off we go in the wind, and grunt, grunt, a few miles down we stop to scout House Rock. Here we got another reality check. This rapid was a lot bigger than I remember (but last time i saw it, it was around 13,000cfs). House is a large right hand bend with the water compressing into large waves and a well known hole at the bottom left. The hole at this level was more a big crashing wave that would close out occasionally. The waves leading up to it were truly colossal. Massive mismatched waves peaking in multiple directions all leading into this maw of whitewater at the bottom. With the high water there was a strong tongue of water pushing left into the maw of death, so everyone's main objective was to pull right and hopefully survive. All the boatmen had good runs, along with the inital kayak runs. I was pretty psyched to have caught a rare kayak eddy (the water was so high, were were virtually none anywhere) at the middle right of the drop to play safety boater for the rafts. However this turned out not to be such a great plan as when I peeled out of the eddy and onto the torturous eddy line (because only crazy people would peel out further river left), I was promptly typewrited directly left over to the main part of the drop despite my very best effort to stay right. Therefore, I ran the massive mismatched waves and was subsequently pummelled in the hole at the bottom. I rolled up after I washed out, and my shoulder, not the strongest to begin with, was protesting greatly. So much for House.

Entering the Roaring Twenties was really fun. At lunch the wind had died off like it never existed and everyone breathed a sign of relief. The rapids were big but the eddies below were just as much of a challenge. Periodically either boiling up 12 to 18 inches above the water line, or swirling down into 4 ft deep whirlpools, you never really knew what was in store for you. The kayakers were frequently running away from the wash out at the bottom of rapids just as much as the holes in the rapids. Fun stuff.

We saw our first of 30 Big Horn Sheep at mile 27. Fabulous. Bucket List item number 2, Check!

Camp was at Shimuno, as we wanted to hike Silver Grotto. I didn't remember this hike being such a difficult climb. We later realized you could (and really always should) carry a throw bag with you on these side hikes. Usually, someone will figure out a more user friendly way to get into a side canyon, but unfortunatly this happens at the end of a hike when folks have already resigned themselves to missing it. As it was, we found a piece of webbing around a chockstone that would have allowed us to use a rope to belay the non climbers up and over the last waterfall which would have allowed them to explore the Grotto. :-(

Ok, things I learned on day 0-2 and will want to retain for my next trip:

1. Visit Lee's Ranch, about a 15 min walk from the Ferry if you take the cliff trail.
2. Be flexible on your first camp, don't do big miles (or even moderate miles) on the first day.
3. Scout banal Badger unless you're a river guru with excellent karma.
4. Keep your binoculars handy. We saw Big Horn Sheep, Condors, Hawks, constantly throughout the river.
5. Bring a throw bag on any side hike. Do not expect straight forward paths to lead you to side hikes. Many times these are made by people who don't know where they are going (just like us). I had Side Hikes from the River, by Tom Martin, as a reference, but it didn't really help direct us for short hikes like this.
6. Have the Trip Leader be off for the first day of camp duties if you have non river people doing chores. They need a bit of advice and how-to so give yourself time to give it.
7. If you have a decent drive (or just like GC history) check out this excellent, entertaining book/audio book called Grand Canyon by Gary McCarthy. It is a fictionalized story of William Dunn, one of the deserters of Powell's first expedition. The premise is he survives the Indian attack at Separation Canyon and settles at the So Rim. It's a great book that weaves all the GC icons (Powell/Hance/Lee/etc) into an entertaining epic spanning 60 years. By the end of the drive out West, the kids happily knew more GC history than any of the adults on the trip.  Here's the link http://www.amazon.com/Grand-Canyon-Gary-McCarthy/dp/1556867069/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1315246016&sr=8-13

Ok, see you next week. I'll post usually on Fridays.