Rapid epiphany about the Grand Canyon

SPECIAL TO THE PRESS

BY LORETTA B. HARDING

Until this summer, I poohpoohed all the fuss about the Grand Canyon. I was a Grand Canyon denier.

I had dismissed one of the seven wonders of the natural world as just a big crack in the desert landscape. In 1980, I had briefly looked over its north rim to take what was considered a selfie in those days (another person takes your picture for you, so you don't fall into the abyss). I fled the overlook immediately because it was 106 degrees in the shade that day.

A photo of the Grand Canyon captures only a nanosecond of its life that is estimated to be 1.84 billion years old. In addition, still photos that look over and not into the Grand Canyon can make it look one-dimensional, when it has a depth of more than 6,000 feet.

I was not alone in my depth deception.

Back in 1540, after hearing Hopi guides talk about a “great desert river,” whose width measured several hundred yards across, the first Spanish explorers to look over the rim of the Grand Canyon in search of the Colorado River judged its width to be “no more than eight feet across,” (historical notes from The Emerald Mile by Kevin Fedarko).

Three days later, Don Garcia Lopez de Cardenas decided to test his sense of scale and dispatched two of his most agile soldiers to just scramble down to look at the river and, perhaps, to drink its waters to see if it was potable. The men were able to descend only a tiny fraction of the distance before returning. They pointed to a stone column that appeared from the rim to be only the height of a man. The soldiers said that the tower was, in fact, taller than the great belfry on the Seville Cathedral, which was 344 feet high.

The prospect of further exploration became so daunting to Cardenas and his men that no European went into the Grand Canyon for more than three centuries until Maj. John Wesley Powell set out to map the Colorado River.

It took me three decades to return because I was never a huge fan of the desert. There are snakes and scorpions in it. It is also hot and dry - unattractive to a cool weather girl who likes forests of trees and water in all its forms.

As with Powell, white water was what drew me to the desert at long last. This year I finally had the opportunity to check off a long-standing item on my bucket list — to run one of the wildest rivers on earth, the Colorado River. Going into the Grand Canyon to get to the Colorado River at the bottom started my epiphany — appreciating the Grand Canyon.

A rafting trip through the canyon is made up of two parts. The first is sitting mesmerized on a gently gliding raft as the most colorful, diverse and stunning rock formations on earth roll by. I looked up at giant maize-colored eroded cathedrals that could hold at least 50 Seville Cathedrals. The neighboring rocky “building” could have been a great rustcolored mosque one billion years ago. The edifice next to that looked like an ancient marble post office building reaching into the heavens. Around the next bend was a red, smoothedout Mt. Rushmore, and later, a pink Crazy Horse Memorial landscaped with green Tamarisk trees, or the orange Taj Mahal of the Paleozoic southwest.

Rocks in seemingly unimaginable and infinite combinations were striped and tilted, jagged and smooth. They brought to mind alabaster pillars from ancient Greece, sandy statues from Petra or terra cotta warriors from China. Imaginary statues 1.5 billion years-old appeared to have been sanded out and varnished with a patina of age. They were made of limestone, sandstone, shale, quartzite or schist. I never tired of looking at all the combinations and re-imagining all of history.

The second part of the rafting trip was the occasional interruption of grandeur to hang on for dear life. At approximately every mile, a creek from a side canyon entered the river where it created rapids with the big rocks washed in front of it. Our Colorado River journey from Lees Ferry to our helicopter pad at take out was 187 miles. That's about how many times we got drenched with icy cold water and we descended some 2,000 feet in the process.

Several of the rapids took care of 30 of those feet individually, within just the first two of their ten standing waves, called haystacks.

It would take a special picture to fully convey the danger and turbulence of the glorious rapids of the Colorado River. Even as we were about to enter a benignlooking class eight rapids, I would think, “We can take these rapids.”

That was before we went into the rapids.

A common mistake is to think that the tops of the waves I saw ahead of us were the entire waves. Then I looked ahead, past the rapids bubbling along many feet below where I was waiting to enter them and realized the larger bottom portion of the standing waves I was disrespecting had been hidden. And now they were upon us.

Often the fifth wave in a rapids was a refreshing slap in the face, and at other times it was a haymaker from the haystack. One never knew when a walloping 15-foot wave would knock my hat off, twist my glasses askew or throw my hands off their handholds. When a hand flies off the handhold, the person at the other end of the hand can easily fly off the boat.

People not holding on correctly with both hands have been known to break a wrist, tear a bicep or go for an unplanned swim in a watery rock tumbler.

To rehearse surviving a swim in the rapids, we pulled over to a scenic side canyon to swim through some mild rapids before hitting the big water with names such as Sockdalager, Hermit, Lava and Crystal. Mostly we heard warnings such as, “If you're thinking of swimming in waves one through four, DON'T!”

When kayaking through Minnesota riffles during the spring runoff, we might get splashes of water over the bow that is a couple of inches above the water line. On the Colorado River, the J-Rig we rode was least 10 feet above the water line, and completely disappeared inside the waters of most of the rapids.

At the end of each day, the rafters were all exhausted. We'd done nothing all day long but sit and look up at grand scenery as we rolled by, and looked down at a boiling river filled with eddies and whirlpools. Occasionally, we interrupted our reverie to brace ourselves with everything we had to meet the Colorado River face to face.

Now that I had immersed myself into the Grand Canyon and into the rapids, I exalted that they were both more than deserving of respect and admiration.

I want to do it again.

Job Corps career training openings at the Hubert H. Humphrey campus

Free career training and help with finding immediate job openings in leading industries is now available at the Job Corps Hubert H. Humphrey campus in Saint Paul to people between the ages of 16 and 24.

Enrollment is open to young adults receiving benefits such as TANF, SNAP, and free or reduced school lunch. It is also open to foster and homeless youth.

This year, the program expedites the enrollment process to those experiencing homelessness. Training in the summer program will give young adults the tools to get higherpaying jobs and apprenticeships. Participants can expect to train for high-growth jobs such as construction, finance and business, hospitality and health care.

This program is from the U.S. Department of Labor. More information can be found on the Job Corps website jobcorps.gov or call 800-733-JOBS (5627).

Class reunions announced

Mariner High School Class of 1983 will hold their 40-year reunion Saturday, Sept. 23 from 7 to 11 p.m.

at the Hugo American Legion Post 620. For more information or to purchase a ticket, contact: Paula Anderson Delesha at pjtoday18@ gmail.com; Bob Sommerdorf at wabedomn2@aol.com; or Angel Meier Lang at Angellang01@ comcast.net.

The Class of 1973 will celebrate their 50th reunion Saturday, Sept. 9 beginning t 6 p.m. at the White Bear Country Inn. A golf tournament is also scheduled Friday, Sept. 8. For registration and information about reunion events, visit whitebearhigh1973. net.

Support cancer survivors through Relay for Life

Cancer survivors, caregivers, and those who love them are invited to the 29th Annual Relay For Life of White Bear Lake, held from 6 to 10 p.m. July 28 at White Bear Lake Area High School South Campus. The event includes speakers and a lap around the luminary-lit track led by a bagpiper. The luminaries contain a candle and the names of those lost to cancer and those still fighting. Other features include live music, kids’ activities, online auction, and food provided by the White Bear Lake Lions.

Funds raised support American Cancer Society programs and research. For information, go to wbrelay.org.

Watch tennis, support children’s cancer research

Celebrating its 38th anniversary, the Pine Tree Apple Tennis Classic will be serving up aces Aug. 3-6 at LifeTime in White Bear Lake. The annual tournament supports targeted pediatric oncology research efforts at Children’s Minnesota and 200 other hospitals in 49 countries around the world. The public is invited to watch the four-day event which features 175 of the top mixed doubles tennis players in Minnesota and the Upper Midwest. Admission is free. The 2023 tournament features play in four divisions - Open, Masters (35+), Grand Masters (50+) and Juniors. In addition to tennis, there is a food tent featuring Pine Tree Apple Orchard treats and specialty beverages, an online silent auction, Art Crawl, kids craft area, new merchandise offerings and more, with all proceeds benefiting the cause. For more information about the event and the programs it supports, visit ptacf.org.

White Bear Lake Area