Colorado River Project: River Report Summer 2003

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tual, I sat down on the backpack I would use to haul my 50 pounds of gear on the hike out of the Grand Canyon at the end of my tourney. On the beach, I observed the preparations underway for what amounted to creating an expedi- tion — appeasing my John Wesley Powell fantasy. Until Powell and his parry of 10 navigated and mapped the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon in 1869, the area was marked "unexplored" on contemporary maps of North America. If you bought a map back then, it had a big blank spot for the very location where I was sitting on the beach. Powell and his parry made their journey in wooden boats — slightly modified, flat - bottom fishing boats of the time. Of course, a 21st century Colorado River expedition differs considerably from Powell's — namely in terms of safeguards and luxury. First and fore- most, there are maps detailing every mile of the river, including the degree of difficulty for the rapids. Instead of oak, all the boats on our trip were made from synthetic materials, mostly rubber, and are considered unsinkable because of their many separately inflated compart- ments. Our multicolored fleet that would float more than 30 people down the river was comprised of six smaller rafts, known commonly as "oar boats" (each to be rowed by one experienced "boatman"); one self - bailing paddle raft (to be paddled by a party of seven); several one - person kayaks; and one behemoth, motorized pontoon boat that carried the majority of the gear load. Other conveniences included the large ice coolers necessary to keep perishables (and carbonated beverages) refrigerated; propane gas stoves for cooking; "dry bags" (vinyl, waterproof bags with roll down tops that can handle full submersion in water while keeping one's gear completely dry); tables; sleeping bags and high -tech nylon tents for shelter from the weather; eight portable (and also, importantly, sealable) toilets — known among the boaters as "groovers"; and two hand - washing facilities composed of two 5- gallon buckets with a foot - operated pump, spigots and anti - bacterial soap. Sanitation has taken a front seat within the river - running community, particularly on the commercial trips, and with good reason. Last summer, over 100 people were sickened by the Norovirus virus on several tours — the same bug that made hundreds of people ill on cruise ships last summer and the common cause of "stomach flu." Some of the victims from last year's outbreak suffered so severely from dehydration that they required evacuation by helicopter from the canyon — an expensive and labor- intensive operation. Charles Higgins is a regional public health consultant with the National Park Service (NPS) and an officer with the U.S. Public Health Service. Higgins is working to educate the river - running community about how to avoid the virus and said he expects the virus to remain a recurring problem for boaters despite education. "There is no reason to expect that the virus will disappear," said Higgins, who also said there were outbreaks of the virus in 2000 and 1994. The virus can be transmitted via food, water, or person -to- person through contamina- tion by infected feces and vomit, something that can happen easily when people are living in primitive conditions and are in constant close proximity to one another. One example Higgins gave for easy transmission is when a human chain is formed to load and unload gear from the boats. How the virus makes its way into the canyon is still being investigated. I set to work getting my gear stowed and finding the correct sized life jacket.