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Below is a collection of Arizona Newspapers Association (ANA) award-winning "OnTheEdge" articles Grand Canyon: Redefining the self
Mary Reid, my girlfriend at that time, endured the worst of me. Being confined in small apartment made both of our lives difficult. Without Mary’s encouragement and help, I would have easily given up. Being bedridden for almost six months resulted in my right leg – with the help of a plethora of pins, screws and plates – healing enough for me to graduate to crutches. Living on the second floor would help me to perfect the fine art of mobility on crutches. Hobbling up and down the steep concrete stairs of the apartment seemed as challenging as any mountain I had climbed. A fall here could easily send me back to the hospital. But, with great care and determination, I was able to successfully “summit” to my second-floor apartment daily. Month after month of tolerating physical therapists, chiropractors and acupuncturists – along with weight-lifting and ingesting bottle upon bottle of vitamins – allowed my strength and balance to slowly return. Almost a year to the day after my accident, my cast was permanently removed. I began to plot my escape from the confining world of stucco walls to the deep, weathered canyons of sandstone, which had waited patiently for me all these millions of geological years. The Grand Canyon had always been my home away from home. I was possessed by it. A more beautiful place couldn’t be found in which to taste life this deeply. When I was in my hospital bed, I would daydream about the Canyon being the last vision my eyes would gaze upon – its majestic colored mesas and the shimmering Colorado River below. Although the hopeful fate of the masses was to die in bed surrounded by familiar faces, I feared such a final consequence. I had hiked into the Canyon’s depths countless times. I would risk life and limb for just one more intimate encounter. To die in the act of love – every lover’s fondest dream. But reality is usually different from the fantasy. This trip would be distinct. I was dealing with a body and mind that wasn’t completely healed. I hoped that by returning to the Canyon – my Canyon – I could find some semblance of my former self. I would do this trip solo to help me restore my self-confidence, which – like my leg – had been shattered by my fall. I packed my gear in my truck and headed for the South Rim. The radio in the truck wouldn’t work, which gave me even more time to think about what I was doing. Doubt and confusion kept creeping into my mind. Three and a half hours and 225 miles later, I arrived at the Canyon – mentally drained. Despite my mounting skepticism of what I was doing, I bit my lower lip and made my way to the trailhead. I chose to backpack down the Boucher trail, one of the more difficult routes into the Canyon – a place where only turkey vultures would comfort you. It was 11 miles to the Colorado River, 22 miles round-trip. The final section of the trail – the steep and strenuous 2,400-foot descent to Boucher Creek would be the most challenging. I put the heavy backpack on and headed down the trail... - See Part 2 below. Grand Canyon: Redefening the self
As I headed into the Grand Canyon on the Boucher Trail I reflected on my last trip into this remote labyrinth several years before my accident. I was unbroken and spirited. Canyon hiking for me was a soul-enriching journey into a serene and beautiful world. A hike from the rim of the Canyon to the Colorado River and back again was almost effortless for me. But things had changed – I had changed. Still recovering from my climbing accident, the Canyon had now become a daunting physical exercise in navigating on endless and intricate terrain. My right ankle had less than five degrees of movement. It would easily become stiff, which would cause me to trip on the easiest of topography. Instead of “plowing” my way through obscure landscapes, I now had to delicately walk on rock-strewn trails with the caution of a person in a minefield. It was twice the amount of effort to cover the same distances I had so easily traveled in the past. The Boucher Trail is not maintained by the Park Service, adding to its backcountry “charm.” It descends sharply through an encyclopedia of wonderfully colored geologic layers. A slip or a wrong step on this rugged trail could easily send a hiker plummeting down hundreds of feet of loose limestone and sandstone into the Canyon below. I knew the confidence I had developed from past treks would now need to be tempered with patience. An overconfident mind in a less-than-willing body could be disastrous on this trip. The first three miles of the trail from Dripping Springs was virtually flat. I easily covered the distance without so much as a blister, but this was about to change. Reaching Travertine Canyon, an obstacle course of large boulders and steepening terrain, I slowed to a snail’s pace. In several places I had to remove my backpack and lower it. Seeing what was below me was a guessing game. As I slowly worked my way down the toe-jamming trail into the inner canyon, I took the time – or, in reality, by design, was “forced” to take the time – to “see” the Canyon in a different light. It somehow had become more vast and beautiful, yet forbidding. Brachiopod fossils lay scattered at my feet. At my slowing pace, I somehow felt a connection to this fate. After an exhausting descent to the top of the Redwall section of the Canyon, the trail leveled out. The accident-induced arthritis had eaten away most of the cartilage in my ankle joint. The bone-to-bone grinding made me wince in pain. Even with another five miles and 2,000 feet to descend I refused to turn around. I would not allow myself to be beaten. The daylight began to dim, and so did the weather. A light rain started to fall. As I approached the last and steepest part of the trail, it became very slippery. A miscalculated foot step on this narrow section would send me hurtling down to the distant creek below. I was tired, wet and on precarious footing, but a light from a campsite far below beckoned me onward. After 16 painful hours of hiking, I arrived at my destination – Boucher Creek. Wracked with pain, I dropped my backpack and, with the last of my energy, set up my small one-man tent and crawled in. Too exhausted to care about covering the rest of my gear outside, I passed out to the sound of comforting light raindrops hitting the tent. Waking the next morning, I could barely stand up. My right ankle was swollen and a sharp pain shot through it with each step. I counted six blisters on each foot and my quadriceps were as tight as piano wire. I gazed at the trail that I had come down. I was almost 4,000 feet and 11 miles away from my starting point. The rim so far above seemed as remote as my salvation from the past. I nursed my blisters; ate and refilled my water bottles. It was still early morning and I knew if I wanted to get back to my truck before midnight I needed to leave immediately. I gathered my gear and started back up the torturous trail. At two in the morning I arrived on the South Rim of the Canyon. My entire body was stiff with pain. I was humbled by the experience. Wilfred Thesiger the author of “Arabian Sands,” wrote, “No man can live this life and emerge unchanged. He will carry, however faint, the imprint of the desert, the brand which marks the nomad; and he will have within him the yearning to return, weak or insistent according to his nature. For this cruel land can cast a spell which no temperate clime can match." As I looked out at the moonlit Canyon, I realized how insignificant and unimportant I truly was. I found myself paying homage – not only to the Canyon, but also to myself for not surrendering my spirit. Volcanos in the mist
It was night and our taxi driver had just picked up Therese, my traveling companion, and myself from a day of sailing off the Pacific Ocean coast. Our taxi driver, Marlon, was unfamiliar with the area, but was told by locals that a narrow dirt back road would save us an hour off the normal four-hour drive back to our hotel. Therese and I were sharing the small taxi with our driver’s two friends – one who was hung over from cheap tequila; the other a quiet, handsome teenager with dreadlocks. It was drizzling, and the sound of raindrops pelting the dense undergrowth in the surrounding jungle added to the effect of being far, very far from home. Marlon's desperate eyes met mine through the rearview mirror each time he tried to restart the engine and failed. I joked with Marlon about our predicament, and he reacted with a nervous laugh. I could tell I was not helping the situation and thought about what a convenient spot this would be to be robbed and murdered; the crocs leaving little or no evidence – a thought I quickly dismissed despite Marlon’s nervousness. Therese, a veteran flight attendant of 18 years, and I had flown to Costa Rica as an exploratory trip of sorts – to see as much as possible within the confines of six days. Our goal was to see the volcanoes, waterfalls and butterfly farms, do the treetop canopy tour, visit the hot springs, and take in some horseback riding, kayaking, rafting and sailing. A crazier couple couldn’t have been found in the deepest of jungles. Of course, the stuck taxi on the second-to-last day of our trip wasn’t on the list. But hey, adventure has a way of finding me even when I’m not looking for it. Costa Rica is an eco-tourist and wildlife-seeker’s paradise. Nature Reserves and National Parks comprise 25 percent of the country, and the Costa Ricans take great pride in that fact. Howling monkeys, scarlet macaws, toucans and iguanas can be spotted in most areas, but to see the hundreds of exotic species that call Costa Rica home, an off-the-beaten-path trip would be advised. Scenes from the movie “Congo” and “1492” were filmed in Costa Rica and might give the first-time traveler some idea of the topography of the country. But a hands-on trip to the Arenal Volcano, which still erupts almost daily with explosions and glowing lava, or traversing the Sky Walk trail in the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve alone is worth a visit to this beautiful country. Costa Rica has over 1,000 species of butterflies (about 5 percent of the species worldwide), including the spectacular Blue Morpho and Giant Swallowtail with their 5-inch wingspans. Butterflies can be spotted from the smoky summits of 9,000-foot volcanoes to the arid inland areas. On the opposite end of the food chain are the snakes. There are 130 species, including some of the most poisonous, such as the fer-de-lance or the Bushmaster – which locals call the matabuey or ox-killer. But even during the short time Therese and I have spent here, we agree that the most dangerous Costa Rican species of all must be the drivers. Marlon finally gets the taxi started and we head back down the bumpy dirt road, only to come to a fork. There are no signs. A vote is quickly taken: the right fork wins unanimously. The road becomes rougher; my 4-wheel-drive Isuzu Trooper would have trouble clearing some of the boulders. Marlon’s small and overloaded taxi bottoms out hard on several of them and the engine develops a noisy exhaust leak. The road winds up a steeply graded hill and the taxi begins smelling of burning transmission fluid. Marlon tries his best to look unworried, but I can sense his uneasiness at the possibility of spending the night in the jungle. The darkness of the road ahead is suddenly broken by the appearance of the first of only two vehicles we would run into that evening. Marlon slows down and signals the other driver to stop, but our headlights reveal the scared white faces of tourists who look even more lost than we are. They don’t stop and speed by us. The road becomes muddy from the rain and the taxi slides down the steep inclined road like it’s on black ice. Only the armadillo-sized boulders we hit slow us down. Just as I start to wonder if we’ll ever make it back to the hotel we approach a sign in the road... – See Part 2 below. Volcanos in the mist
I might be considered a fatalistic traveler – keeping my guardian angel working overtime – but I do my homework. Books, field guides and maps clutter my floors and tables. They are dotted with food stains and scribbled sidebar notes as I read and dream of these far-away places that I visualize in my head. The actuality of these foreign lands is rarely as good as the vision you create, but you never know when you’re going to be surprised. Mix a little reality in with your imagination and just go. From war zones to remote wildernesses, Robert Young Pelton has become famous for traveling to and writing about the most dangerous places on earth. Pelton suggests that, when traveling especially to third-world countries, carry two wallets – one with expired credit cards and a wad of small denomination bills in it. The logic is to hand it over to whoever is robbing you and hopefully they will only take a quick glance at its contents and think they are making off with some real booty. This only works if you’re robbed once on the trip and they are in a rush to get away, which, most are. On this trip to Costa Rica with Therese, I took Pelton up on his advice and kept my dummy wallet in my right front pocket and my real one in my left. Like a seasoned gunfighter with lighting speed, I was ready to pull it out and hand it over to the first bandito I happened upon or who happened upon me. Getting shot or being kidnapped didn’t fit in this equation, though. Of course, Costa Rica is closer in character to Tahiti than war-torn Afghanistan. Most of my travels rarely involve straight lines or the use of a finely tuned Swiss timepiece. They aren’t as well planned as a trip you’d take on your honeymoon – in fact, far from it. My itinerary is usually unstructured, which sometimes gives me the excitement of changing my plans at the last minute. Of course, a certain amount of anxiety always accompanies me on these haphazard journeys. It isn’t so much the place you’re visiting being the adventure, but rather the strangers you meet and entrust yourself to who make the adventure. So, as Therese and I endured the late-night bumpy back road ride in the Costa Rican rainforest with our taxi driver, Marlon, I put this credo to the test. Even with Marlon being lost, I felt completely at ease in his company and abilities. Therese and I had developed a rapport with Marlon from the beginning. He had picked us up at our hotel early in the morning and drove us the four hours to the beach for a sailboat excursion. When confined in a taxi for hours at a time with an intelligent driver who speaks your language, you can find out a lot about a country. Our politics and environmental philosophies ran along similar lines. Marlon was more than forthcoming with a wealth of information about his country – places I hadn’t read about in the most informative of guidebooks on Costa Rica. Despite the cryptic hand-painted road signs we came upon that evening, Marlon eventually got us back to our hotel intact. Marlon apologized profusely for the unexpected off-the-beaten-path ride and refused any money I offered. It wasn’t our only positive experience with the Costa Rican people. Therese, who has traveled and hitchhiked across Japan and South Korea unscathed, took this all in stride. Considerably less paranoid than me, she told me to set aside my fears and just enjoy the trip – because the real adventure was yet to come. – to be continued in the March 2, 2005 issue. Swept away by the ‘broom of God’ Near the southern tip of South America lies a windswept landscape of bent trees and ice-covered spires called Patagonia. Chile and Argentina border this land, whose outstanding feature is a sharp chain of legendary Andean mountains – Cerro Torre, Torre Egger, Punta Herron and Cerro Standhart. The most prominent is Cerro Torre. Standing at 10,262 feet, this sheer granite needle with its frightening overhanging granite walls was once considered unclimbable.
The wicked Patagonia weather, however, had its own plans – and we weren’t on its guest list. Winds of more than 100 mph 24 hours a day forced us to spend three weeks tent-bound at base camp, and we were quickly reaching our breaking point. The gale-like storms caused the nylon tent walls to flap violently, creating a deafening echo chamber within the tent. Sleep was non-existent. We had to shout at each other just to be heard in the close quarters of the tents. Walking several yards away from our shelters in these winds meant being blown off our feet. Any form of outside activity resulted in being sprayed by high-velocity ice crystals. Cuts and small pockmarks covered our faces and hands. Being confined together for such a length of time magnified the most minute annoyances into intense arguments and full-blown fights. Two angels directly descended from heaven wouldn’t last a week in the severe Patagonia landscape without inflicting each other with black eyes and bloodied noses. On the fourth week of our forced interment, the winds finally died, the sun came out, and the barometer began to rise. We decided to climb as two separate teams. Chuck and I would climb the direct South Face route, while Peter, Fredrick and Ian would attempt the famous Compressor route just to the north of us. We packed our gear and parted company, intending to meet either on the summit or at base camp within the next five days. After three days of merciless vertical climbing and nights spent trying to catch some semblance of sleep while clinging to the mountainside on uncomfortable portaledges, Chuck and I were now three-quarters of the way up the jagged ice-covered granite spire. The corniced summit finally seemed within our grasp. Our confidence was soaring like giant Andean condors. The last several days of climbing were almost windless – a rarity in this land of endless hurricane-strength storms. Thousands of feet below us lay a world of glacial ice, with lakes of deep turquoise reflecting the snow-capped pinnacles piercing the clear skies around us. I continued to climb. I was some 60 feet above Chuck when I heard a loud crack and then a rumble. Small rocks and ice chunks began to ricochet off my climbing helmet. I clung to my precariously placed ice axes and pulled myself closer to the rime-covered rock face, bracing myself for the inevitable. - See Part 2 below. Swept away by the ‘broom of God’
Below me, Chuck dodged the maelstrom and, without retreating, firmly held the rope onto which I was tied. The strained rope tightened from the force of the excessive weight of the avalanching snow cascading down upon my body. The ice screws I had placed to catch me in a fall now exploded out of the frozen face like claymore mines, sending ice shrapnel into the falling snow. I flailed wildly at the face with my ice axes to slow my fateful descent, but they ricocheted off the cold diamond-like surface.
When I came to, I found myself on my back. Packed snow and small rocks covered me. A large boulder underneath my back caused it to arch unnaturally. At first I thought I had broken it, but then discovered I could move, and began to crawl out from my icy prison. A spike of pain shot through my right leg and ankle with an intensity that blurred my thoughts and vision. I took a deep breath and tried to move again, but was greeted by the magnifying pain. I heard myself yell, then passed out. When I came to, my leg was ice-cold and felt almost dead. I carefully extracted myself and, for the first time, was able to see the impact-induced damage. The bone had fractured above the ankle and was protruding just above the top of my boot. My thermal pants were ripped wide open from my ankle to my knee. Deep cuts covering my leg were filled with dirt and snow. I began to hyperventilate so hard my lungs felt like they would explode. I watched helplessly as my blood trickled over the ledge I was on and then froze into small crimson icicles. Chuck was nowhere in sight. Only 15 yards separated me from thousands of vertical feet to the glacier below. I could only guess that the avalanche had swept him off the ledge and into the abyss. The realization of his fate overwhelmed me. I was alone. The cold and pain now began to eat away at my will to live. I lay in the snow as though I was nailed to a horizontal cross. I began to cry; the selfish tears froze on my cheeks. Chuck had once told me that all of our extreme adventures were worth the effort to live through. He said that in order to survive there was always something left in your body to burn, even if it was just brain matter. I had always admired Chuck’s bullish, hell-bent, kamakaze style of climbing. Being in the shadow of his abilities and strength was highly addictive. He had helped me overcome many of my fears, which gave me the confidence to challenge myself and succeed. The pain had returned. I was so cold. This was not the way I wanted to die, but I didn’t know if I had a choice. I could sense Chuck’s ghost smiling at me through the swirling snow. It began to claw at my sanity. I was extremely exhausted and confused. I had literally been thrown into the legendary Patagonian meat grinder. The storm-filled evening sky faded into blackness and, with the scent of my blood in the wind, the viciousness of nature was now stalking me. - See Part 3 below.
I knew from experience that if I didn’t find shelter from the tempest I would become just another well-preserved corpse on this peak, dressed in the latest mountaineering wear. I was wet and cold and could feel my core temperature dropping. Soon it would become impossible to make any reasonable decisions. I would become sleepy, and struggling would become a moot point. The storm would consume me like a giant whale inhaling krill. The snow and rock around me was covered in red. I had lost a lot of blood. The now freezing temperatures made me shiver uncontrollably, but helped my blood to coagulate and stopped the bleeding. I was barely hanging on to a life that was now doubtful at best. Twenty feet from where I fell lay one of our haul bags, containing food, sleeping bags, a stove and other essentials. It was badly battered by the falling rock and ice, but its contents were still intact. I crawled to it on my back, like a Marine squirming cautiously under barbed wire. The slightest wrong move now would cause searing pain to rip through my shattered leg and I would pass out again. This was not an option with darkness approaching and the stinging cold wind on my face. I began to sweat as I crawled, yet I was freezing. I tried to stay focused on the importance of getting to the haul bag and kept telling myself to take a deep breath with each movement. After what felt like hours, I was finally within reach of the bag and pulled it towards me. My hands had become clutched fists from the tightened muscles in my cold body. I clawed the large zipper on the haul bag open and dug around through the jumbled gear for a headlamp. After pulling out a dozen objects, I managed to reach it. I prayed that it wasn’t broken. Without it, I was surely dead. I carefully turned the rotating lens to switch it on, but nothing happened. My heart began to sink into the blackness of despair. I banged the headlamp against a small rock lying next to me – still nothing. I cursed at the gods above. Just as I was ready to submit to the darkness it went on – I had light! The sudden illumination caused a brief resurgence of life in me. I took advantage of this and quickly pulled out a sleeping bag, the stove, a quart-size pot, Snickers bars and tea bags. I pumped the stove’s pressure plunger and, unlike the erratic headlamp, the built-in igniter fired flawlessly. I scraped the hardening snow’s surface with my blood-covered gloves and placed the frozen ice crystals in the pot on the stove. The ice quickly melted and became a boiling pink-colored mixture of water and blood. I poured the burning liquid into my tea-laden cup and drank, ignoring the scalding of my mouth and tongue. I inhaled three Snickers bars and immediately felt nauseous. I couldn’t afford to throw up – the loss of this life-sustaining liquid and nourishment would be fatal. I took several deep breaths and calmed myself. The queasiness passed and I began the ardous task of unpacking my narrow sleeping bag and squeezing into it. This seemed physically impossible, given that my swollen and frostbitten feet were encased in razor-sharp crampon-covered mountaineering boots. I feared that the cold and the injury would eat away at my will to care. I knew that the fight for my life was just beginning. - See Part 4 below Swept away by the ‘broom of God’
It was the night of the new moon, the darkest of the month. The cloud-covered skies smothered the light of the stars – it was pitch black. The howling wind tore at my womb-like sleeping bag and my sanity. I felt like a helpless fetus about to be aborted by a cold steel hanger. After hours of being tormented by the wind, I fell into a coma-like sleep. The darkness now entered the deepest corners of my fragile mind. I saw myself facing a black marble headstone with no inscription, as if saying I was a nameless and empty being without beginning or end. The disturbing nature of the nightmare jerked me violently awake. My heart was racing; my breathing short and shallow. The small slit I had made in the sleeping bag to help me breathe had become sealed with ice particles from my moist breath – I gasped for air. Disoriented, I tore at the ripstop nylon like Houdini trying to escape from his fateful straight-jacketed last performance. As I emerged from the sleeping bag, the sun hit me full face. Despite the bright sky, my spirits sank when I discovered that more than half of my gear had blown off the ledge during the night and now lay thousands of feet below me. My right ankle had quit bleeding, but my foot was hideously bent in an unnatural position. I thought of Chuck; tears burned my eyes. I knew I wouldn’t be able to survive another night alone on this rock without hope. The possibility of rescue was at least a week away. I thought of the irony of it all: that it was the mountains that had given me a reason to live; now it would be the reason I would die. I had fallen off the edge of the known universe. I tried desperately to rekindle the almost-extinguished fire of life in me. With the last of my hammered spirit and body, I crawled on my stomach and gathered what was left of my remaining equipment – the stove with a half-full fuel bottle, two quarts of water, a cooking pot and lid, a lighter, the sleeping bag, and a knife. The food, extra water, ropes, first-aid kit, and dry clothing were gone. I had just enough to keep myself barely alive for another day or two. The ledge I was on was covered with a considerable amount of snow from the avalanche. While laying on my left side, I used the pot lid to dig a narrow trench through the middle of the deepest pile. By late afternoon I had finished removing a three-foot by seven-foot section of snow. It resembled a grave more than a shelter. I collected my meager gear and made my open-roofed “igloo” as comfortable as I could. Tired, in pain, hungry and cold, I pulled the sleeping bag over me and waited for the darkness from above – like a priest administering the Last Rites. Without an ounce of energy left, I quickly fell asleep – but, instead of being visited by nightmares, a warm and glowing hand reached out to touch me, to pull me through the doorway in which I was standing. The loving hand offered me peace and an intense, loving warmth I had never known before. The hand beckoned me to pass through the doorway and grasp it. Yet something held me back – the heavy burden of physical life; its hardships, its pains and its sorrows. It called me by name, and my name weighed heavy with guilt; the guilt of a unredeemed life. My name blended with the wind and I slowly drifted out of my dream and back into the cold reality of this world. As I lay there I could hear the distant sound of someone yelling. Was salvation at hand, or had I finally gone insane? - See Part 5 below. Swept away by the ‘broom of God’
My mind wandered into that grey area between light and shadow … insanity can become so real that it just isn’t insanity anymore. I felt it would be easier to die than to make sense of the painful memories that haunted me. Something shook me back into consciousness. I slowly came to and focused on the blurred shape above me. “Hey, amigo, you look like hell!” It was Ian. Peter, Fredrick and Ian had attempted a different route on Cerro Torre than Chuck and I, and had also failed to summit because of the storm. Instead of rappelling directly back down to base camp, they traversed across the rime-covered granite to the ledge I was on. It was pure dumb luck that they had spotted me. Ian, who had spent most of his life in the African bush, took one look at my blood-soaked and torn clothing, said, “Damn! You look like you were attacked by a lion.” I was so dehydrated my blood felt like it was as thick as crystallized syrup. Only my basic mental functions of sight and hearing remained. As my fellow climbers nursed my wounds, a barrage of questions ensued. I was only able to mumble that Chuck was dead. Exhausted from uttering those few words, I quickly fell back into a stupor. For the first time in my life, I would become the rescued instead of the rescuer – a role I would not adapt well to. While Fredrick served me hot tea, painkillers and dried fruit, Ian and Peter rigged their ropes to lower me several thousand vertical feet to the valley below. The process of re-rigging the ropes every 150 feet to each established anchor point with an injured climber in tow would be tedious and highly dangerous. I was an emaciated spectator, unable to help with the easiest of tasks – nothing more than dead weight. As I was lowered from the overhanging walls, Ian was alongside of me, keeping my injured body as stable as he could against the spinning effect of the wind. I couldn’t feel anything but cold from my waist down. The swaying of the rope, along with the drugs, gave me a feeling of weightlessness, which put me into a relaxed, comatose sleep. Hours turned into days. I was never conscious long enough to retain any memorable realities. I do remember the heavy diesel-laden air in the bus as I endured the rough ride into town, and a doctor at the small spartan clinic in Punta Arenas. Looking down at me, he spoke Spanish with a serious tone – I understood little except the warmth of the morphine he injected into my protruding veins. A kaleidoscope of broken images and muffled sounds marked my surreal journey back to the States. My physical recovery took several years, although my mangled right leg has never fully healed. The emotional scars, however, would be with me for the rest of my life. The reoccurring theme of fighting for my life on ice-covered pinnacles would wear thin after 25 years of trespassing above the clouds and leaving friends behind, frozen in place and in time. The unforgettably sad memories feel like a cancer that will slowly eat me alive. I no longer have the will to fight those demons in the mist, in my mind. I thought the past struggles for survival were like ice and would melt away with time. But they remain as crystal-clear and cold as the day they were created. How many deep experiences and memories of love and death can one soul endure in a lifetime without going mad? I’m sure I’ll find out soon. The remaining strength I have is reserved for my dreams – to be with those I left behind among those distant mountains that part the clouds. The rope attached to me now is not connected to another friend or climber, but the phantom boulder that missed me on that fateful and horrible day. It plunges into the abyss below me and I knowingly await its pull and to be swept away by la escoba de Dios – the broom of God.
I continue to hike without compass or landmarks. I am pulled to the distant Canyon’s rim like steel shavings drawn to a magnet. After an hour of hiking from where I left the truck, the forest gives way to pockmarked limestone ledges and a view of the Grand Canyon that few will ever see. The spirits below await me. But they will have to wait until morning. It is late afternoon and the emotionally draining hike has left me fatigued. I drop my pack and spread out my sleeping pad and bag. I left the tent behind; it seemed like a luxury item in this stark landscape. I felt its presence would offend whatever ancient and spiritual forces remained. I slide into my sleeping bag and watch the sun as it gently sets behind mysterious and distant sandstone temples. My eyelids grow heavy and I drift to sleep. But, somewhere between dusk and dawn, I have a foreboding dream. I am at home sitting at my desk. A small lamp behind me casts my shadow on the wall in front of me. Slowly, a dark shadow begins to materialize on top of mine; it continues to grow and take on an unearthly and eerie shape. The manifestation begins to overwhelm my shadow. It is without any defined shape, but it becomes denser and darker than the deepest and most frigid of oceans. As it approaches me from behind, I feel its ominous presence. I feel the life draining from my limbs. Startled, I awake from this seemingly real nightmare, shaking from the cold and fear. As my mind slowly shifts from a dream state into reality, my eyes desperately try to focus on the inky blackness of the night; my pupils dilating to catch even the smallest beacon of light. The moonless and cloud-covered sky keep even the brightest of stars from giving me a bearing. In the absence of light, the dark prevails. The only sound was that of my palpitating heart. The Canyon to my right and the forest to my left remained silent. I had also left my flashlight behind. I knew that a light aimed in the forest would only produce shadows and cause one’s imagination to see God-knows-what, imagined or real. A light aimed into the vastness of the Canyon would only be swallowed by the impenetrable black void, leaving me still more unsettled. I lay motionless; only my sense of hearing – magnified by the lack of sight – remained. But the overwhelming silence of my surroundings slowly lulls me back into a dreamless sleep. I am awakened by a gentle Canyon sunrise. It welcomes me on the small patch of ground I share with pine cones and sagebrush. I shake off the evening nightmare with a cup a coffee and an energy bar. I look out into the Canyon. The only sound comes from the melancholy chirping of a Canyon wren, which darts from one ledge to another. I go over the day’s schedule of “activities” in my mind. I will try and retrace my steps from years past down through the rugged limestone walls which protect and hide my objective – a magical petroglyph that stands alone among petroglyphs. I pack enough water and food for two days, even though I hopefully plan on being back by nightfall. Within a hundred yards, the terrain becomes steep. I slide down a loose scree slope littered with sharp jagged rocks that begin to roll down with me. There are three of these slopes; each about 100 feet in height and separated by short, narrow deer trails. I will have to carefully negotiate my way down this fluid maze. A misstep here could send me careening out of control into the large boulders below. – See Part 2 below Spirits in the stone
This wilderness logic echoes through my mind as I continue to slide down the loose scree slopes. I am in a squatted position; one leg extended out with the other tucked under me as I sit on the heel of my boot and slide like a 10-year-old on a toboggan. I reach the bottom of the slope, stand up, brush off the grey dust on my pants and walk out to my next obstacle – a series of ledges resembling the staircase in a giant’s decaying castle. The way down at first does not seem apparent. I walk along its edge to find a weakness in the rock for me to enter; a route that won’t lead me to a dead end. I find a spot that seems vulnerable to my scrambling abilities and crawl down, one ledge to the next. Within a matter of minutes, I have reached the base of the Coconino limestone, the third geological layer from the rim of the Canyon. I realize where I am and get that uneasy sense of being watched. Just below me and to my right is an Anasazi burial ledge I discovered years before. Several splintered bones could still be seen protruding from the powdery dirt of their resting place. Quietly I tiptoe pass it and out onto a limestone deck with a drop-off that brought back an old feeling from my childhood – a fear of heights; acrophobia. I began to seriously wonder why I was there. Maybe I just liked to torment myself. I still wasn’t sure what I sensed; it had no clear definition. The many years confined to sepia-toned cities left me with little insight to this world of spirits. I descend another 100 feet and come upon a weathered sandstone wall. This one is covered with dozens of small, shallow, wind-carved caves; the largest of which is maybe five feet in height and length. I peer into it. Painted pottery shards, arrowheads and split-twig figurines litter the floor. Above lies a smaller chamber. I climb up to it and discover several clay pots, completely intact except for a small chip on the larger of the two. The intricate spiderweb-like designs painted on them almost looked modern. I marvel at these ancient urns for several minutes, but my foothold is unstable and I climb back down. The Anasazi and Cohonina were known to have populated these regions from A.D. 500 to 1500 and then disappeared from the Canyon. One hundred and fifty years later, the Cerbat, ancestors of the present-day Hualapai and Havasupai, inhabited these lands. Twenty-four years ago, when I first visited this spot with my friend Chuck, he came upon an extremely rusted iron ax almost completely buried in the dirt of one of the deeper ledges. Another friend of mine, an archeologist who had been on digs across the Southwest, studied the photos I had taken of the ax. He believed that the early Spanish explorers of the mid-1500s probably traded it to the native peoples that occupied these lands. How it found its way here to this remote ledge was a mystery. I check several more of the sandstone grottos and find the ax – it is still there after all these years. I take several photos and leave everything as I found it. I continue along a narrow section of ledges covered with fissures and cracks, and carefully work my way down to my goal – a well-hidden and cryptic petroglyph. – See Conclusion below Spirits in the stone
Small prickly pear cactus grow out of some of the larger cracks on the ledge. I carefully step over them, but, in trying to keep my balance, brush up against them. The shins of my legs are now covered with the fine needles of these “guardians” to the petroglyphs I am seeking.
Twenty minutes later, I come upon a 4-foot break in the ledge. To proceed, I have to jump this short chasm, the other side of which is covered with loose rocks. Maintaining my balance, I carefully remove my pack and throw it to the other side of the chasm. I take a deep breath and leap. I land ungracefully, but am glad not to have sprained an ankle on the wobbly rocks at my feet. The ledge now takes a distinct turn to my right and leads down to a larger ledge, which is at the base of a crevice I have to climb to get to the petroglyphs. Once on this ledge, I take a water and snack break, looking out at the intimate landscape of the Grand Canyon before me. It is early afternoon and the bright sunlight reflects off the red rock walls, whitewashing its otherwise deep colors. As I sit here daydreaming, I can almost hear the faint dialect of an ancient people who vanished from this area hundreds of years ago. This humble area did not possess any dwellings, granaries, or signs of farming. It was steep and barren, with a haunting yet esoteric depth about it. This was a place of ritual. I get up, but leave my pack on the ground and walk over to the crevice. This vertical crack leads to the ledge that records in rock an event whose meaning I can only guess to understand. Despite years of climbing on a variety of rock surfaces, this crevice is difficult even for me to ascend. The crack is too large for a good handhold and too small for a toehold. I slip several times in an attempt to get off the ground, but finally find that by unnaturally jamming my arm in its shallow depths I can move upward. I feel shaky, but my height finally pays off and I quickly reach the lip of the ledge and pull myself over and onto it. The only petroglyphs adorning the floor of the ledge are what look like a planet eclipsing the sun. Below it are a pair of comet-like symbols, each headed in opposite directions. The head of one is filled in; the other is not. Could they possibly represent what astronomers know as sungrazing comets? If these aboriginal people would have been able to see one of these comets crossing over the sun with the naked eye, it would have been a very impressive event and one worth recording. It is skillfully carved into the sandstone and, because of its location on the ledge, is protected from the elements. Several feet away is a wall – blank, with the exception of a lone petroglyph of a man facing down at the “comets.” The man’s legs are curled inward and look like they are broken at the ankles; his arms are held out, but his hands are pointed strangely to the ground. It looks like an Anasazi version of the Crucifixion. Could these symbols depict a celestial event that marked the time when a shaman or leader had died? My gut feeling tells me that it is. I study the petroglyphs further and try to open my mind to other possibilities, but none come. It’s getting late and I need to get back to my campsite. I climb back down, pick up my pack and head out the same way I came. The going is slightly easier as I retrace my steps and emerge from the Canyon before dusk. The campsite is a welcome oasis. I crawl into my sleeping bag and watch a cloudless sky become black and slowly reveal the first of many stars that appear that evening. I lay in wait and reflect on those mystical petroglyphs and their possible meaning. The constellations Orion and Pleiades come into focus and I realize that, like the Canyon itself, the petroglyphs are a symbol of the fragility of this unique landscape; a monument to all that is evanescent. Dread, desires and dreams
But participants of high-risk activities are considered by many to be anomalies and basically unbalanced characters. Being one of these “anomalies” has put me and my fellow comrades outside the norm of society – black sheep, forever cursed to be hooked on an ever-increasing dose of intoxicating adrenaline. Like a smoker who has been told the number of health problems he’ll face if he continues his folly, warnings fall on deaf ears. The addiction can overwhelm the senses and logic. Adrenaline highs can also have another effect on oneself – a feeling of being unique and very different in a world that is inhabited by clones. Uniqueness has many forms. The illusion of knowing you are capable of what most people are incapable of can be very ego satisfying. Of course, herein lies the dilemma. Emotional and intellectual strengths must sometimes be taken from other aspects of your ego to feed the other – an imbalance in the psyche can occur. In my case, years on the rock have left me with a multitude of permanent physical and psychological scars. I have spent weeks in hospitals and I.C. units. From head to toe, my body has jagged stitch marks resembling those sewn by a poorly paid, arthritic seamstress rather than by a qualified doctor. I have even flatlined on several occasions and was revived via defibrillators. Does this give me bragging rights? Has my vision of the world become clearer or been given more depth? Has it made me wiser? Smarter? Not really. These are experiences that just make me who I am. If I lose that, I lose myself. I don’t want my pain taken away; I need my pain. Seeing one’s friends die in the mountains because of poor judgement or the uncontrollable forces of nature can be very sobering. I have, in the last several years, become more vulnerable because the ghosts of my past actions have come back to haunt me. The fears that I once kept safely locked in the deepest recesses of my mind are now peeking out with more frequency. Many people have an assortment of anxieties and fears – some justified, some not – from spiders to armadillos to speaking in public. For me, it’s bank tellers. Whenever I make a deposit or withdrawal, I watch the teller’s eyes focus on a computer monitor with a complete view of my pathetic economic history. I’m naked – I cringe. Looking back at me with telling eyes, they hand me a receipt and tell me to “have a great day.” But as I walk away I can hear their thoughts – “what a loser this guy is.” Some of my fears I’ve overcome in the last several decades. Others, which I never conquered in the past, have become magnified. My greatest fear arises several times a month and by circumstance. I come into contact with a certain, rather beautiful woman. This woman is also a bank teller, which further magnifies the fear factor for me. Her deep, dark and glittering eyes penetrate mine. Her voice vibrates within the hollows of my heart. In my mind’s eye I clearly see a vision of how things could be. I become weak. What is left of my charm dissipates into thin air. My armor over the years has become rusty and lost its sheen. I instantly transform into a stuttering, fumbling, pimple-faced 16-year-old. Whatever self-confidence and courage I had that enabled me to ascend daring peaks now fails me. I try to respond to her questions with wit and humor. My mind goes blank. I answer instead with the flatness of an untuned saxophone. I’ve tried a dozen times to ask her out for coffee, but the words always become as heavy as lead and remain in the back of my throat for me to choke on later. I finally drummed up the nerve to send her flowers and a card. A week later she called me to tell me she was seriously dating someone and wasn’t interested. My dream bubble had been burst. I realize that some adventures are never to be. Like exotic and foreign places I’ve never travelled to and know I never will. Like the things I’ve never done and know I never will. Like that unsuspecting teller, who I know I could never ask out. Are they illusions or merely delusions? Or are they unrealistic desires to be converted into dreams, dreams to be placed in the deep abysses of our souls? Dreams that are not to be acted on or realized, but ones that will forever be just that – our dreams. Kartchner cave-in
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