Our meet-up was at 6:15am in the lobby for our 7am departure to float down the Colorado with Colorado River Discovery guides. I had no idea what to expect but I feared more water-related boredom.
We boarded a luxury bus driven by a white-haired Pam from Oregon who kept talking about "dam" this and "dam" that as we drove down a two-mile acess tunnel to the drop-off point just across the Glen Canyon Dam.
The dam was pretty impressive from this vantage point, but still not nearly as big as Hoover Dam further south. We had to wear hard-hats while standing near the rock ledges, just in case there was a falling rock.
The group of 40 got on two rafts. I sat closest to the guide, with Kevin to my left and Iris, Bill and Mom behind me on the outer rafts. Matt and Alex were across from us on the outer side and Jason and Marcela were up front.
The rocks were 700' tall at this point.
Our party boarded the first raft that was led by PJ from California, a 60-something-year-old from Santa Barbara, CA who got his foresty degree from UC Berkeley. His passion for the outdoors was obvious.
After he let everyone introduce themselves (Mom introduced herself as from Germany and added "I am European") we learned that the three young men next to us were from Israel. We also had a Dutch couple and an Indian couple from New Jersey. The others were from the Phoenix area.
But Mom asked all the questions until PJ turned the tide by making everyone be quiet for two minutes to observe the sounds and sights of the river. We were still in the cool shadows of morning and I had to place a jacket over me. But the wildlife was out there: herons, cormorants and even a few perching ospreys, all wildlife I had hope to see on Lake Powell.
The Colorado River here is beautiful as the water slowly meanders around the red rocks. We floated more than we rafted the first three miles as PJ also talked about the geology of the rocks, pointing out fault lines and other protusions along the way. He was the best tour guide of natural history I've had and told him so. (Later on a man from Phoenix on the raft came up to me to agree with me. "I could have asked so many more questions but I didn't want to bore the others")
"There is so much wildlife out here in the mornings, that is why I only lead the morning tours" said PJ. The one bird we didn't see was the California condor, a bird close to extinction that was re-released to the wild nearby in the Vermillion Cliffs.
Soon we passed the Horseshoe Bend, where the rocks stood 1200' tall.
A park ranger next to me, Cynthia Adams, a short blonde woman sporting a long braid in the back got off the raft at our first break to talk about the pectroglyphs on the walls. They were from two eras, one Pueblan and the other more recent, showing big horn sheep and buffalo. A spiny lizard and then a larger gecko scurried along the rock wall as she spoke. When we continue our journey Cynthia stayed behind to talk to the other rafting groups stopping at the site.
It got warmer now as we entered our second hour, admiring the rock formations and looking for ledges that resembled other animals.
By 11am we had approached Lee's Ferry, a narrowing in the river which also was the geographical end of the Colorado Plateau and the start of the Kaibab Plateau. Here the river descended noticably and special permits to float further were required. Our group got out here and re-boarded the bus driven by Pam back to Page, passing Indian settlements, a few hokams and some teepees and the 1200' drop of the Paria River that reflected green below.
Although people started to doze off here, I was wide awake looking at the expansive scenery around me. This was arid country, and Pam repeated several times how the Indians lived in homes with no running water and have to drive into town to fetch it for themselves and their livestock. Was this because the ndians preferred it this way, or because the water company didn't want to bother connecting the communities to city water? I didn't ask Pam but figured she would have given me a vague answer about the fate of James D Lee, a Mormon settler and first ferry runner at his namesake town, Lee's Ferry.
"Was Lee murdered?" I asked her, not sure of the story anymore.
"He was persecuted" replied Pam.
It turns out that Lee, an avid Mormon convert, was one of the main attackers to the 120 immigrants who were killed by a Mormon group in central Utah's Mountain Meadows.
We got back to Page at 1pm and Kevin was hungry for beer and some food before we were to meet up with the gang for one farewell meal at the Lakeside Marina Resort Restaurant.
He wanted to try the Dam Bar and Grille, and I agreed if only to try its Dam Blonde beer.
Everyone but Iris joined us. She stayed in the van with the windows and doors open while she napped during our lunch. (I have done a van nap many a times, but never with the doors open in a strange town). We were parked in the shade.
The beer was OK and the conversation pleasant. All agreed that we enjoyed the rafting trip. It was hot outside, approaching 90F. JP walked passed us and waved our way. I would have invited him to join us if we weren't in a time crunch by then. I was tired and could have taken a nap instead, but once I was in the hotel room I had less than an hour before dinner and was more interested in checking my email and down-loading my pics to Jason's computer.
"You would make a great tour guide" said Marcela, referring to my love for the outdoors and my passion with languages and learning new things. It's a thought I've had for a while.
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http://www.coriverdiscovery.com/
http://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/people/i_r/lee.htm
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