After they got the rafts unloaded, but before dinner got under way, almost everyone on the trip wandered on down the river to check out Lava Falls. It was a place of legend, with as many stories about it as Crystal and places upriver. Some said it was the toughest drop on the river; Duane was of the opinion that running it was easier than some said, but the consequences of a screwup could be sobering enough to make up for it. In a way, it was the climax of the trip; the rest downstream, while it would be a good river run almost anywhere else, would be almost anticlimactic after what had gone before.

They stood on the shore, with the customers mostly just watching, while the boatmen debated fine points of this line and that. As they stood there watching, a group from another company scouting the drop headed for their rafts to make their run, so they scrambled for good vantage points to watch. The runs came off successfully, but there was a lot of water in the boats, and everyone got pretty soaked.

“See,” Duane commented as they worked their way back through the rocks and rubble along the shore to their camp, “it can be done, and it’s not really that bad. The important thing is to be prepared for it, and keep our wits while we’re doing it.”

Still, the anticipation of Lava the next morning was the fuel for a lot of talk around the tiny campfire that evening. Duane had a few good stories of Lava runs, and Michelle had more. They tried to make the point that no matter how hairy things may have been, the runs had all been made safely and successfully. The discussion lasted until the compressed paper log had burned out, and slowly everyone made their way to bed.

It would be unfair to say that everyone was confident of easy success the next morning; there was concern, but to say there was a lot of nervousness would be stretching it. The stories of the night before and watching the successful run of the other party late the previous afternoon had at least made the point that it could be done; still, a lot of people stuffed their river clothes into drybags and decided to make the run in swimsuits. There was no point in starting out the day wet, after all, and if a swim became necessary it was better to swim in a swimsuit than to try it clothed. At least breakfast was well attended, and people seemed to look forward to the experience, rather than dreading it.

Once again, they loaded the rafts and lashed everything down tight in preparation for having to do a serious run first thing. As on the other mornings when they had to do big runs, Duane inspected the other rafts, just to make sure in his own mind that everything was ready. For a change he had Barbie look over his raft rather than Michelle; she was still acting as assistant trip leader.

Neither he nor Barbie found anything to complain about; it was clear that, by now, everyone knew what they were doing, even the passengers. It was a good safety habit to get into, one that Duane had learned from Scooter clear back when both of them had been running the Nantahala a long time before. Eight years, he realized after thinking about it for a moment – they’d both come a long way in that time. “Looks good to me,” he finally said to Barbie. “Why don’t you take point?”

“You sure?” she asked, a little surprised.

“Yeah, sure, you’ve gotta do it sometime, and now is as good as any,” he shrugged. “Hell, you’ve run this place dozens of times. I know, I’ve been with you for a lot of them. The point of taking point is to have a raft in good shape below the drop so you can pitch in on rescue if something goes sour. There’s no reason you can’t handle it.”

“Well, all right, if you say so, boss. I guess we’d better do it before I can think about it too much.”

“That’s the spirit,” he said. “Get in, I’ll get you going. Everyone else, let’s just spread out and give each other some space. We’ll close up again below the drop and find a place to wring out before we start to get some miles on.”

In a few moments Barbie was on the water. Duane took his time getting everyone else going before he pulled in his own bow line, then backed the raft out onto the river, a hundred yards or so behind Michelle. He was a little keyed up – Lava will do that to you – but realized that in a few minutes the last real challenge of the trip would be behind them.

As planned, the fact that they had scouted the night before meant that they could run right down to Lava and run it, which might not have been the best idea since things could have changed overnight, but he knew they’d prepared themselves about as well as they could. In the distance ahead, he could see Barbie pull into an eddy briefly for a final look, then pull back into the current and head for the tongue.

There are two possible routes to run Lava, either left or right of a large hole that could eat rafts for breakfast. Everyone agreed that the left run was the easier, relatively speaking; while Duane hadn’t laid down the law it had been pretty well agreed that everyone would go left this time. Duane had run right on some previous trips, as had most of the boatmen – he wasn’t sure about Terry – and Brett had even gone right in a motor rig. It always seemed like the right run provided the better stories, but no one seemed inclined to try it this time and Duane was not in a mood to argue about it.

He watched Barbie start down the rapids, saw the boat go out of sight as it went down the drop, then got quick glimpses of it as it bounded up and down in the standing waves to the left of the hole. In only seconds it was clear that she was through the worst of it, although she still had a little rowing to get herself established in a place to over-watch everyone else coming down.

One by one, the rest of the rafters did the same thing – first Brett, then Terry, then Michelle, and finally he was the only one left. With each one he got glimpses that indicated that everything was going about as well as could be expected. Sometimes the rafts were high on a wave, sometimes all but buried in white water, but they kept going and there was no sign of an upset.

The lip was getting closer now; like a couple others before, he pulled into the eddy for an instant to check that everyone was clear, then got back into the current.

He picked out the landmarks he’d need for his entry line, pulled hard to get on it, and pivoted the raft for entry. It was mild, but fast, running down to the first part of the drop, then the nose of the raft dropped as he began to run down the tongue. “Hang on tight!” he yelled at the last instant.

Somehow, the tongue seemed longer than he remembered, but all he could see now was the curl of the hole at the bottom, reaching out to eat them. He pivoted hard, pulled to the left, got a little momentum, and plunged down into the churning white chaos. Then, the raft reared up and all he could see was the tumultuous white mountainside, but somehow, he managed to keep going straight. The raft reared up, plunged down again, into a monster wave – there was no avoiding it, they’d have to take it head on.

The bow of the raft piled into the wave, and green water came over the bow in a huge splash, soaking everyone down. Sluggishly it began to rise as some of the water drained out the open slats on the floor; somehow they were through it, coming out the other side, rising to meet the next wave, not as bad as the last one. “Yeeeeeee-haaaaaaa!” someone yelled at the top of their lungs. Then, they were bouncing along, in smaller waves, more or less under control, and they became just white swirls. Not far ahead he could see the other Canyon Tours rafts clustered closely together to watch the rafts behind them make their run. He could see that all four were all upright and no one seemed in distress, so that was about the best that could be hoped for.

But no – everything wasn’t all right. He could see that Michelle was once again lying over the side tube of her raft, losing her breakfast. Damn, he thought. Guess she isn’t over it after all.

While he was concerned about Michelle, he was also concerned about the rest of the party. “Everybody make it all right?” he yelled over the roar of the rapids just upstream. He got some cheers and thumbs up, but mostly he was trying to work his way over to Michelle’s raft. In a few seconds he was close enough to ask, “You all right?” – a stupid question, he thought, when it was clear that she wasn’t.

Michelle looked up at him, and to his eye appeared a little flushed. “Yeah, I guess,” she said weakly. “Everything was all right until we went over that first roller, then gaaaak! I barely managed to keep it down till I got this far.”

“Well, son of a bitch,” he said. “Guess you weren’t quite as over it as you thought you were.” He raised his voice and yelled, “Barbie, take point, let’s head for that beach about a quarter mile down on river right. We’ll pull up there and get reorganized.”

“Good enough, Icewater,” she yelled, clearly in a good mood over what was a clean run of Lava for everyone. “See you there.”

Duane stayed by Michelle’s raft until she’d pulled herself back together enough to get on the oars, then let her lead as they ran down to where Barbie had her raft pulled up to shore and was helping Brett and Terry get theirs ashore. There was enough distance between him and Michelle that there wasn’t any way to talk. By the time they got there a lot of people were out of the rafts, just giving each other high-fives and other signs of celebration. A number of people from his raft and Michelle’s joined them as soon as the rafts were tied to shore. He took the opportunity to clamber from his raft to Michelle’s, and sat down close to her on one of the side tubes.

“Damn,” he told her. “I thought you were over it, whatever it is.”

“Well I did, too,” she sighed. “Guess not. Damn, Duane, it’s been a couple days since I felt anything, so to have it come out of nowhere again like this, well, shit, I didn’t know what to do except to barf and try to not mess the boat up too much.”

“If you have to do it, Lava is the best place,” he replied lightly. “That gets the raft washed out in a hurry.”

“Yeah, well, there is that,” she shook her head. “But fuck, this is getting tiresome.”

“Maybe this is the end of it,” he said hopefully. “I just can’t figure out why you and big rapids first thing in the morning aren’t getting along all of a sudden.”

“Me either,” she shrugged. “But it’s getting ridiculous.”

“Well, we won’t have any more big rapids first thing in the morning after this,” he said. “And then you’ll have a few days topside to get over it.”

“Yeah, there is that, too,” she agreed. “For once I don’t think I’m going to mind a few extra days topside. I sure don’t want to have to deal with this the next time I’m on the river.”

“Let’s get our feet back under us on some solid ground,” he suggested. It sounded like a good idea to her, too, so they climbed over the nose of the raft and walked up the beach a few steps. He looked back at Lava, then over at Michelle, his mind going. He was no doctor, and this wasn’t making much sense to him. “Maybe you ought to see a doctor while you’re topside,” he suggested.

“I don’t know,” she shook her head. “Seeing a doctor always seems like such a waste to me. He’ll probably just tell me to take more Pepto before I get on the water.”

“Yeah, but still,” he said, making a mental note to ask Pat and Rachel to bug her about it, just to be on the safe side There was a chance they’d have more luck at it than he would. “We’ll have to see how you feel in a few days.”

“Yeah, I guess,” she shrugged. “Damn, this is lousing up what had been a good trip. I feel all right now, it’s just that, well, that sucked.”

“Let’s give it a few minutes, anyway,” he suggested. “Might as well let everyone get it out of their systems before we do more serious river running.”

In a few minutes everyone seemed ready to settle down and get back on the river. River clothes were dug out of drybags, and most of the boatmen’s dry boxes had some dry customer clothes in them as well. While it was nice to run in swimsuits, the sun would be getting up in the sky very soon, and sunburn would start to become an issue. Duane reminded everyone to dose up on sun block, but good river clothes and wide-brimmed hats were usually better than the best sun block on the market.

What with everything it still took a while to get everyone dressed and back on the water. Once again, Duane had Barbie take point. While he was technically running sweep, everyone on the trip was clustered fairly close together. He took the opportunity to run near Michelle, not because he was that concerned about her, but because she was Michelle, and they rarely got to run close together on the river.

Once they were settled down on the water, he started to make a few plans. Earlier, before they’d started this morning, he’d more or less planned to shoot for stopping just above Kolb Rapids the day after next. It was about the right length run to get set for the last night’s stop, which the Canyon Tours trips usually liked to make at one of several good sites near Granite Springs. But that meant another fairly heavy rapids, although not anywhere near the class of Hance, Granite, or Lava, the first thing in the morning. Since his plans were sort of general and he hadn’t really discussed this one much, trying to be flexible, no one would notice if he moved his target upstream about three miles. There were a lot of good campsites in that area, some that neither he nor Michelle had ever stayed at. They’d often thought that it would be fun to try one or another of them out sometime, and this was a good time to do it.

Doing that meant they could stop a little earlier tonight, he thought, maybe around Boulder Wash, another place that seemed it might be pretty good, and would balance things out a little better. They’d never stopped there either – well, maybe Michelle had, although if she had she’d never mentioned it to him. It would mean a longish run to Granite Spring, although nothing really out of line. Gonna have to get Barbie off to the side next trip, he thought, and talk to her about planning for campsite selection a bit, although there probably wouldn’t be anything he could tell her that she didn’t already know from having been a boatman for several years.

After the active start it was a long, lazy day. With the exception of Lava there were no major rapids today, and hardly even any that could be called minor ones. They took several stops, mostly for the sake of making the stops, exploring around a little bit and just enjoying the closing days of the trip. He noticed that Erika was riding with Terry, instead of Barbie as she usually did, and that Terry was letting her get in some oar time while he spread out on top of the gear pile to take in some rays and get a nap in the process. Nice work if you can get it, he thought. If Erika and Terry were really sniffing around each other it hadn’t been very evident to the customers, which was how Duane wanted things to be. Still, he figured that he’d better get them off to the side sometime and remind them of that.

A while after lunch they drifted by Whitmore Wash, which was always a place that Duane was glad to have behind him. There was a small helipad just upstream on river left, where customers on some of the motor rig trips were flown out; if they happened by at the wrong time the buzzing of the choppers could be very irritating, as used to the wild of the Canyon as they had gotten. The helicopters just sort of reminded everyone that the trip was coming to an end and there really was civilization out there after all. But the choppers weren’t flying when they came by this time, so they made a brief stop to check out some ancient pictographs on the far side of the river from the helipad, then got on their way again.

They stopped for the night a few miles below, at Boulder Wash, right where Duane had intended. They were a little lazy about getting around in the morning; again they would have a little shorter run than planned, and with nothing much in the way of rapids. Michelle didn’t mention anything about her stomach being upset, and Duane didn’t want to remind her by asking.

Again, it was an easy day, although people were getting a little down at the thought of the trip coming to an end so soon. As planned, they pulled in for the night at a spot about three miles above Kolb Rapids at a place that was nameless, at least as far as Duane knew. He hadn’t stopped there before, but it made a pretty good place to stay the night, so he decided he wouldn’t have any problems with staying there again if it worked out that way.

The last full day of the trip was a little more lively. There were several moderate rapids this day, nothing like as bad as upstream but capable of reminding them that this was still the Grand Canyon. Since they’d had their night stop a little sooner than Duane had originally planned, it was a longish day, almost twenty river miles, the longest of the trip. Once again they took their time, and there were several stops before they finally called it a day at a site a little below Granite Spring Rapids. From here on down there was only one little rapids, and that meant they wouldn’t have to tie everything down quite as tightly for the last few miles they’d be on the river before their pickup at Diamond Creek the next morning.

The last night on the river was always a mixture of celebration and melancholy, and it was no different this time. Way back up the river, Duane had said that everyone would get to know everyone a lot better, and there could be some lifetime friendships made, and, as almost always, that seemed to be the case this time. That evening there was discussion among the passengers of a possible run of the river together again sometime next year or in five years or whatever, or possibly meeting for some other trips. Two couples, one from California and the other from Ohio, had seemed to become especially close friends and might stay that way. Duane thought that it would be interesting to find out of it really happened, and at the same time knew that he’d probably never know.

One of the Canyon Tours traditions was a steak fry the last night out. Elaborate preparations had been made to keep the steaks frozen for over two weeks, starting with chilling them to near-cryogenic temperatures and then packing them in dry ice in a heavy cooler. They tasted good when grilled in the last kitchen of the trip, and as the final fire burned that evening Duane asked everyone on the trip to speak a little of the experience they’d had and what they had learned on it.

To wrap up the evening, Duane quoted Major Powell, from memory: “‘Now the danger is over, now the toil has ceased, now the gloom has disappeared, now the firmament is bounded only by the horizon, and what a vast expanse of constellations can be seen! The river rolls by us in silent majesty, the quiet of the camp is sweet; our joy is ecstasy. We sit till long after midnight, talking of the Grand Canyon, talking of home.’” There just wasn’t a lot to add to that; a hundred and forty years before, the one-armed man who had been the first to see the splendor of the Canyon had said what needed to be said on this evening just about as well as it could be done.

As always, things were slow getting around in the morning. Though there were still a few miles to run, for the most part the trip seemed to be over. The customers – now mostly friends – were thinking of home and travel arrangements, while the boatmen were thinking of things like hot showers, comfortable beds, the Burro, and the coin laundry next door. In reality, the boatmen thought they were the lucky ones – in a few days, they’d be at Lee’s Ferry, getting set to do it all over again.

Finally they got out on the water to run the last few miles, which included one rapids so minor as to be barely worth the mention. A couple miles farther on they went around a slight bend to see the Canyon Tours crew bus and a pickup with the raft trailer hooked on behind, with Al and Jeff waiting for them. They ran the rafts up onto shore a final time, and unloading started. The trip was over.

To be continued . . .

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