We did not get as much time to hike as I would have liked. We had a head wind at the start of the trip that slowed us down, and we had extra time at the end of the trip that we probably could have spent hiking. But we did manage to hike to the Nankoweap granaries, swam in the Little Colorado, hiked to the water fall at Clear Creek, hiked up to Phantom Ranch, hiked up Tepeats creek, hiked and swam at Elves Chasm, hiked to the throne room at Deer Creek, hiked and swam at Havasu, and did a few other exploratory hikes from various camps. I wish we could have done Olo and Matkatameba, but we will have to do them next time.

We brought two single IKs and enjoyed paddling some of the rapids up to class 6 or 7 when we could get out of our rowing responsibilities and had the energy to do it. There were 4 or 5 swims from the IKs, but none were traumatic at all and most self rescued and kept going. I would have liked to have run Hermit in the IK but I had to row the raft (which was also a kick). We saw a lot of big horn sheep, and some people in our group saw a rattlesnake and a gila monster. We also saw one beaver, a lot of lizards and mice, blue herons, and some squirrels that seemed to waive us over to their beach.

We decided not to bring our 11-year old on this trip due to concern for his safety. There were a few times when I was glad, for his safety’s sake, that he was not there (e.g., when getting ready to run House Rock). But I would bring him next time. Missing him was the hardest part of the trip. Our 15-year old had a good time and adapted well to the demanding work schedule, and it was great to spend the time with her. She had a lot of fun in the IK. Our 20-year old did well at the oars on the first half of the trip, and I was hoping to take turns with him rowing the harder rapids below Phantom. But he decided to leave the trip and hike out at Phantom.

Running the Grand Canyon was a lot of work and took a lot of vacation time, but we really enjoyed it and learned a lot about how to row and how to organize a long river trip.

Allan