March 26

It seems wrong somehow, but apparently we have two-way communication of a sort, even here, deep in the Canyon. Leif Mortenson tells me people reading the blog have been curious about how my flash drive ended up in the water. Nothing dramatic, I’m afraid: I just dropped it in a couple of inches of water in the bottom of my raft. And apparently it’s still working. On with Day 6.

How to write …

March 25

Just before 6:00 a.m. and it’s starting to get light. We’re camped at a place called Tatahatso, a small sandy beach tucked in a bend at river left, 38 miles downriver from our put-in at Lee’s Ferry. Above us a huge bowl-shaped amphitheater is carved into the cliffs overhead–a short steep slope and a few moves along a narrow ledge gets you
there. Yesterday Greg Hatten and I climbed up there, and scrambled …

March 24

A fairly uneventful day completing our run through a series of 10 rapids called the Roaring Twenties, stretching from just past river mile 20 to river mile 29. Short easy runs that we don’t bother to scout. Along the way we stop at Vasey’s Paradise to refill our water supply. Here a small waterfall drops directly from a limestone cliff far above. It’s a simple task to haul our 5-gallon water cans up …

March 23

Note: Yesterday’s rigorous empirical testing confirms that you can immerse a flash drive in 47-degree water and it will still work.

It’s 6:22 a.m.–Daylight here in the canyon, even on a small beach tucked in beneath steep cliffs, and people are beginning to stir. There’s the clank of pots and pans as the breakfast crew begins their work, a few quiet voices, and the sound of the river as it ripples and splashes …

Only a tiny part of the mountains of gear we had to load on five 18-foot rafts and five wooden boats. Yes, there are 16 people on the trip. Yes, we’ll be gone for three weeks. Still, it’s a hell of a lot of gear.

Inflating our five rafts. That big trailer was piled FULL when we started unloading.

The raft I’ll …

March 22

Up before the sun, at 5:30. Not too many people stirring yet. A few birds chirping, the sky just
right enough to see by, the quiet rush of the water flowing past. The plan is for the kitchen crew
to be up at 6:30, with coffee call for the rest at 7:00, giving us enough time to pack up our tents
and gear before breakfast. The first day of re-packing the boats, Tom …

March 21
We’ve had an easy day for my introduction to Grand Canyon river running. After spending yesterday moving mountains of gear (dry bags, ammo cans, more dry bags, more ammo cans, rocket boxes, kitchen boxes, propane tanks, food, more food, more dry bags, along with piles of every other conceivable waterproof container) onto the boats and lashing them down with cam straps, buckles, more straps (four-footers, six-footers, nine-footers, an overwhelming tangle of straps for …

Hi all,

The launch is very near.  Wednesday at about 11:00 am we start our 24 day – 280 mile trip down Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. Winter is not done as snow covers northern Arizona but we will shove off will five replica 1950s & early 1960s boats.   Somewhere on our journey Spring will come!

 …

by Tom Pamperin

Six months ago I had the good luck to meet Dave Mortenson, who has introduced me to an entire world of river runners, canyoneers, and yes, boat builders, a group that spans the decades from the 1940s to today. Norm Nevills. Moulty Fulmer. Brick Mortenson. P. T. (aka Pat) Reilly. Men mixed up in the beginning of modern Grand Canyon river trips and the origins of the dory-based whitewater boats still used …