Grand Canyon - Day 9

Sunday, October 3, 2010 - By Erin

Strong winds blew through camp last night! A lot of gear was tossed around and it generated quite a bit of excitement. I woke up in the middle of the night and saw a lot of headlamp activity around camp. There was so much going on that I thought maybe I better get up as well to check on things. Everything seemed ok in our area, but I did tighten up the rain fly just in case!

For breakfast we had a real treat! The outfitter had sent us off with several dozen loaves of white sourdough bread. No one was very keen on using the white bread for sandwiches, but someone had a fantastic idea – make French toast instead! Wendy confirmed that there were adequate eggs for this special treat, so Dan and the cooking crew made fresh French toast for breakfast – complete with real maple syrup and granola – yum!

After the usual camp pack up, we set off for our first big rapid of the day – Horn Rapid. Horn was less than a mile downstream, so it didn’t take long to get there. We stopped to scout and spent awhile contemplating the options. We had been told by several raft guides to start left of center, come in on the tongue just to the right of the horns and then pull hard to get back left. It didn’t look impossible, so we came up with a game plan and got started.

I decided to join Dan S. on his raft because Dad and Wendy planned to walk around the rapid on river right. Dan and Tim opted not to run the rapid and instead ferried across the river and carried their kayaks down river left to set up as safety boaters at the bottom. Jim portaged down on river right. With several kayakers in position, we set the raft order and prepared to head out. Martie had also decided to walk around, so John rode with Sam, Alison with Larry, and David with Max. Max and David were up first. Dan S. was interested in seeing their run, so he was in position on the rocks to see how things went. Max started just to the right of the horns as we had been told to do by several river guides, but they ran into trouble pretty quickly. Max had little opportunity to pull left and was pushed hard toward river right – directly into a large rock in the current’s path. Max and David highsided against the rock. The raft was momentarily pinned before Max was able to push it off. The raft had flipped.

All of this happened in just a few quick seconds and most of us could not see any of what was going on. When Dan S. gave the signal that Max and David were against the rock, Andy and Michael rushed to their kayaks and quickly ran through the rapid to help any swimmers and to corral the upside down raft. After seeing what happened to Max, the other oarsmen changed their line and ran the route through the horns. Dan and I followed Max and split the horns. It wasn’t perfect, but it was a good clean run! All of the other rafts also made it through the horns without problem.

Once we were all at the bottom of Horn Rapid, it took another hour or so to get everyone together and on the same side of the river. After much discussion, the flipped raft was carefully moved across the river and flipped right-side up. It was a stressful morning, but we managed to get everything back where it needed to go. The only causalities were a broken oar, a lost umbrella, and a lost tow rope.

We got back on the river and headed out with plans to stop at the first good lunch beach that we saw. We had a long lunch and relaxed a bit after the events of the morning. After lunch, we ran through Salt Creek rapid and paddled into a fierce headwind before arriving at Granite Rapid. When we arrived at Granite, Andy decided that this might be a great stop for a layover day. Since we were already there, we went ahead and scouted the rapid. Several kayakers ran through for the fun of it. Andy and Michael had clean runs down the right. Tim, on the other hand, was hell bent on taking a left run around the bottom hole. So much so that he ended up running right through the bottom hole – upside down and backwards. It was a great show!

After dinner, several of us started a card game. I eventually crept off to bed, but the card game continued well into the night. Everyone was definitely looking forward to having a layover day!