1998 Grand Canyon / California Trip, part 4

Monday, August 30, 1998--Initial descent, Roaring Springs, Cottonwood
It finally came time to hoist the pack that would be my home and with which I would have a love/hate relationship over the next 5 days. Damn, was it heavy! We took some “starting out” pictures by the van, then started down the North Kaibab Trail. Once Jim’s daughter, Jeannie, drove off in the van, we were committed. Plus, we had already bought our “Rim-to-Rim” t-shirts the day before at the North Rim gift shop, so we had to now earn the right to wear the shirts.

It rained a bit on us on the initial part of the way down, but the rain lessened as we descended in elevation. One interesting thing about the Canyon is that it can be raining HARD on the rim, but it can actually evaporate before it falls the 5000-6000 feet down to the river. The rain was nice, because it kept the temperature down during the day. The walking stick I had also bought at the gift shop turned out to be a stellar purchase...I really needed it on the downhill hiking. You figure you’ll need strong legs when hiking uphill OUT of the Canyon, but you work other leg muscles going downhill, especially when carrying a heavy pack. I had done some training for this hike, but apparently not enough. After our leg muscles started to get weak and wobbly, most of us began shuffling awkwardly after a couple of thousand vertical feet downhill. This “I-have-no-leg-muscles-left” walking motion is called the “Kaibab Shuffle” by the locals.

It was this day that I also discovered a phenomenon called “water intoxication” that can happen to folks doing longer hikes down into the Canyon interior. Because you sweat so much in the hot, dry air of the Canyon interior (typically less than 10% humidity), you should actually drink not just water but Gatorade or the like. Water is fine if you’re hiking for an hour or so, but hiking with a heavy pack all day with thousands of feet of elevation change makes you lose electrolytes / minerals that need to be replaced. Anyway, I started feeling nauseous, and someone in our group figured this was what I was experiencing. I didn’t have any Gatorade or drink mix powder packs with me, but someone in our group shared with me and I started feeling better soon.

Heading down in, our group started singing little songs as if we were kids on a road trip (which, come to think of it, we were essentially doing the day before). We hit such standards as “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” “Don’t Worry, Be Happy,” and “Lean on Me”. With the weight of my pack souring my mood and leg muscles, my song contribution was AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell”.

We stopped and soaked our feet and had lunch at Roaring Springs, about 3000’ below the North Rim. It was here that I got my first and only injury of the trip—a small cut—when I used my thigh as a cutting board for a beef stick / summer sausage. I don’t think this mistake was from “water intoxication”—I think I was just being a dumb ass! After lunch we had some pretty hot hiking (about 95F) from Roaring Springs into Cottonwood Camp, about 4000’ below the North Rim. We soaked our whole bodies in Bright Angel Creek and set up camp. Check the feet … good, no blisters so far. Time for dinner.

Cathy had packed along about a 6-pound bag of dried apricots, which she realized was probably too much. So she began immediately offering them to everyone else to help lighten her pack ... it would be the first of about 50 such offers over the next 4 days. At least these were much better than a Dookie Bar!

Irene got a bit of a scare that evening when the picnic table she was eating dinner at shifted when someone stood up, startling her, causing her to flinch/clench her tender arm and aggravate the pain. We were a little worried she might not be able to continue, but she applied some portable one-time-use cool packs (pretty clever little packs that use a chemical reaction to get cold and don’t need refrigeration) and was good to go after that. If I had been her, doing a 5-day strenuous hiking trip with a broken arm, I think I would have taken about 50 Vicodin pills in my pack with me!