In the olden days, when winter temps in Gunnison hovered around 20 below for months on end, spring break saw hordes of college kids fleeing to the deserts of southeastern Utah. Typically, this involved camping, beer, and walking around in the desert with skin exposed that hadn’t seen the sun since autumn. One particular spring break, after the usual desert silliness around Moab, Michael Bain and I remained in the desert, but asked the returning hordes passing through the town of Cimarron to tell Jimmie Newberry to bring the canoe, more food, more beer, and meet us on the potash mine road. This would be back in the day when things we knew nothing about often sounded like really great ideas. We had a boat, paddles, food, and beer, but no shuttle, no map, no knowledge, and no plan. What could possibly go wrong?

Jimmie duly showed up and we put in on the Colorado River west of Moab near the potash mine. The weather was warm and we had no agenda to speak of, so we tended to eddy out early and often to go wandering up every side canyon we saw. Typically these places had seen only beavers and herons as visitors, so getting past the tamarisk and willows along the shore often entailed crawling on our bellies like reptiles, all good wholesome fun when you have the knees and back of a twenty-year old.


All of this wonderful “back-to-nature” activity made us pretty filthy so we eddied out at a nice little sand bar to wash the crud off. Raised on Tarzan movies as a kid, I was always on the lookout for “quicksand” but the best we could find was some moderately slow sand that we could actually sink up past our ankles in. Still, it was all great grand fun defying gravity in non-traditional ways.


All of this farcing around was exhausting work and we camped early. Camping in the desert wilderness is hard work. There were tents not to be set up, flat sandy sleeping spots not to be cleared off, and hours of searching for firewood not to be done. Fortunately, we were young and tough and equal to the challenge.


The second morning on the river dawned sunny and beautiful. We continued on paddling gently down the stream, serenaded by the music from Jimmie’s flute. The melodious echoes off the canyon walls were often accompanied by birds responding to the song from Jimmie’s flute. Often I have marveled at the special magic evoked by playing flutes, penny whistles, and recorders in the desert and listening to the birds’ call and response. Day two involved a few additional river miles travelled and an abundance of side canyons explored.


At the second nights camp site we faced a growing dilemma. Since we had no real idea of what awaited down river, but had heard rumors of a raging river of death in Cataract Canyon, we thought it might be a good idea to avoid venturing too much farther into the unknown. Since we had neglected to take a map, arrange a shuttle, or develop a plan much beyond the opening of the next beer, we thought that perhaps we should turn around on the third day and paddle back up stream. Up to now the river had been gentle and we had been aided in our trip by a current going the same direction that we were. However, that same “gentle” current was a relentless force in its opposition to our progress going back up stream and we soon realized that we might be overmatched. We settled on a plan to paddle furiously upstream from one sand bar to the next, then get out and pull the canoe whenever the water was shallow enough to do so. We thus paddled from point bar to point bar and taking advantage of any local upstream eddy we found. This allowed us to walk in the shallows pulling our boat for 2/3 to ¾ of the distance from our put-in to our turn around spot. Although the first two days had been idyllic floating, that third day was a death march of epic proportions. It is amazing what you can learn about river hydrodynamics when you attempt to paddle against the prevailing current. That evening we ate enough Mexican food in Moab to feed ten men before continuing our drive home to Gunnison.


Post script: In the ensuing years I have paddled thousands of river miles and successfully avoided paddling even one mile upstream following this particular adventure. This past summer Michael Bain paddled across the River Styx after a life filled with backcountry adventures. R.I.P Michael, you are greatly missed and fondly remembered. Jimmy and I remain best buds, and hope to paddle (downstream) again one of these days.