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Notes on the Grand Canyon - A photo essay
StoreTags: grand canyon, water, me me me
Author: timmo on April 07 2008 Viewed 1091 times. 11 people liked this blog. You can rate it below if you haven't already.
People who enjoyed reading this: Zanf, jdg, Fredo, Roshi, infradead, celibacyclub, astroid, MonkeyPlus1, ricemutt, tylth, KimJongEel
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OK, so a little while ago I wrote about going to take a ride down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. I've been back a while and I figured I would waste time (mine and yours) and offer up some of my thoughts along with some pictures taken by myself and others on my trip. I doubt you will make it all the way through this unless you really have nothing to do.
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Driving from Portland to Lee's Ferry takes about 19 hours if you go fast. Staying over in Twin Falls is good but it was so freaking cold there. Like 15F. And windy. And it smells.
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(Ice on my kayak)
There aren't many options in Lee's Ferry if you are a crazy herbivore like me, just a $16 salad that consists of iceberg lettuce and cucumbers. Add to that 10 carnivores amazed that I didn't want meat on my salad. Out of the 11 people who went on the trip, I was one of them, and I knew two others. If you have problems with people, they will come out over 16 days on the river...luckily everyone got along really well, and that made for a fun trip. I heard stories of people simply walking out because they can't get along with the people they are stuck with, divorce, all that good stuff.
Its really hard to describe to someone who hasn't seen the Grand Canyon how big it is. I mean, I've been there now (this was my first time) and I don't really comprehend how big it is. You just have to go. And you should go. Its pretty big.
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(400+ ft high bridge near the start of the trip)
The weird thing is that after 16 days of the same gigantic canyon, it basically becomes normal, even though it is really crazy weird.
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(This is what it looks like a lot)
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(Or it looks like this)
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(Or perhaps this)
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(Maybe you get the idea)
The first four days were pretty cold and rainy and lots of wind that we had to paddle into, which made for some long days. Because this early in the year light doesn't get into the canyon for very long, so our days went about like this:
Get up at 5-6 AM, on the river by 8-9, paddle, paddle, paddle, lunch, paddle, paddle, off the river by 5-6 PM, try to setup before it got dark, eat dinner in the dark, go to sleep. Repeat.
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(Cooking in the dark)
For several nights the moon was quite bright and full, and would come up over the canyon at 3AM or so and wake me, and probably everyone, up, it was like a weirdo sun.
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(Taken at night, that's the moonlight yo)
Of course the paddling part was cool, I will get to that, but also the side canyons were really interesting. Aside from the weird rocks and so forth, seeing clear or blue water was really fun after being in chocolate milk all day.
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(Havasu Canyon, yes the water is crazy blue like that)
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(Clear water mixing with brown)
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(Another limestone side canyon)
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(Me in a different side canyon)
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(Me getting a video up some side canyon)
Some of the side canyons are small, and some are big, again, it is hard to stress how large the place is in general, see for yourself:
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(Me standing on a large rock, "holding-jug-of-wine, one-leg-raised" position from Drunken Boxing)
Now wider:
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(Still on the rock)
Since the Grand Canyon has rock in there that is somewhere around 1.5 billion years old, there is a lot of history, geological and human.
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(1.5 million year old worms)
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(A nautaloid fossil, which is sort of hard to see)
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(Native American pottery shards)
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(Petroglyph carved into a rock)
And of course there was the boating. The trip that we did was 16 days long and we covered around 220 miles. There are lots of rapids, but there is also a lot of flatwater where you just have to put your head down and go. Being in a tiny kayak was cool because some rafter had to carry my stuff. Paddling a raft would be some serious hard work. On top of that it is harder to maneuver in the rapids, and if you do flip a raft it takes a lot of work to flip it back. Honestly I don't know why people raft at all, but I'm glad they do, so they can carry my stuff. Seriously though, the rafters were really cool and nice to carry my stuff. And each rafter had at least one passenger! That person didn't have to do anything but sit there! At least I propelled myself.
Once again, the rapids are really large. Not very hard, but very, very large. And very fast. And fun. I have been kayaking for over 15 years now and these rapids were definitely fun.
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(Entering a smaller rapid)
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(Entering a larger rapid)
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(Me plus one other in a longer rapid)
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(Scouting one of the biggest rapids, we are highlighted so you can see us)
Sorry I'm showing lots of just me, I don't get many pictures of myself boating for some reason. These two are perhaps some of my favorite because they show the scale of the place well.
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(About to go deep inside)
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(Half a second later, there's my paddle)
And of course the scale and power of the river is shown well when it is shooting 15 foot rafts out of the water, rafts loaded with several hundred pounds of stuff on them. One guy had a GPS, and said that through the rapids they would hit about 15 MPH, which doesn't sound totally fast, but for a self propelled craft in water, that's pretty damn fast.
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(Raft shooting out of a wave, two people in front, one in back)
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(Another raft with two people)
This is perhaps my favorite picture on the whole trip, that wall of water is just incredible and is about eat them up.
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(Big wave coming!)
Of course on a trip like that you might have some trouble. We actually had very little. Only a popped raft floor (easy to fix) and one flipped raft (also easy to fix).
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(Flipping over a popped raft)
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(Flipping a raft in a different way)
Near the end of the trip, there was a large volume of water released from the Glen Canyon dam, raising the water level from the normal 8000-14000 cubic feet per second to about 41000. This gave the river quite a different feel, obviously it felt way, way, way bigger. It flooded a portion of our campsite as it rose, though we knew it would happen, so we didn't lose anything. But it was wild to watch a river already that large get three times larger.
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(A raft where our kitchen used to be, now under several feet of water)
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(The end of the trip, the takeout still under water)
Once we were done we had to pack everything up, and drive home. We spent the night in a weird suburb of Las Vegas, in a hotel that seemed to house a nice population of tweekers. I guess that could be said for most Vegas hotels, but it was my first time there, so I was impressed. I had to shower 3 times before I felt like I got the sand out of everywhere. And then I had to shower 3 more times at home before I felt clean from the Vegas hotel.
So I guess that's it. Thanks for reading! As a bonus for getting to the end, here are some random pictures from the trip:
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(Contrast in the canyon)
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(One of our campsites)
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(Surfing a small wave)
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(One of my campsites, with my home made tarpy)
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(Ammo can toilet)
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(Some junk I found)
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(Cool panorama)
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(Another cool panorama)
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Comments
04/07/08
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Zanf
amazing photos - thanks for sharing. Wil you be posting more on flickr [or another photo site] maybe?
04/07/08
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jdg
i red the hole thing
04/07/08
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Fredo
wow. Inspired!!!
04/07/08
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p
that night shot is great (and unbelievably bright) as is the canyon contrast shot. I need to get out there eventually.
04/07/08
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Fredo
yeah, this has made me yearn to travel.
04/07/08
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tantan
SWEET
lol @ ammo toilet
04/07/08
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MonkeyPlus1
very cool... looks like a good place to decompress from cabin fever!
Recent blogs: MBM pictures
04/07/08
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deltasleep
I really need to do something like this.
04/07/08
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timmo
Zanf->, if you really want to see a couple thousand, yes over a thousand pictures from the trip, here you go : link
We had a well documented trip, along with stills I shot a few hours of footage and so did someone else, and actually a couple people on the trip haven't posted their photos yet, so there are probably a lot more.
tantan->The ammo can toilet is pretty cool and is actually a rocket box, and its just the correct height for a toilet. A fun fact is that they are often called "groovers" because before someone thought to put a seat on there, you just sat on the box which put grooves on you (butt) cheeks.
everyone else-> You should go! I am lucky that I get to travel a lot for my job, which makes me want to travel for fun. I think it is important to see your world! Go go go!
I almost forgot, here is a collection of recordings I made from a small stream in a side canyon:
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04/07/08
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yghartsyrt
wow. that was pretty amazing.
it's always bizarre to see how small humans are compared the massivity of the grand canyon.
04/08/08
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tylth
it's always bizarre to see how small humans are compared the massivity of the MY PENIS. HA! I am so brilliant!
i enjoyed your blog timmo. must have been a great trip
04/08/08
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p
timmo said: "
I almost forgot, here is a collection of recordings I made from a small stream in a side canyon:
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I'd say you almost forgot the best part for the sond crowd 
nice
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