Rafting the Grand Canyon - Part Two

As we continue the odyssey onto Day Four, I have begun scanning images from a photo album of the trip...augmenting my higher-quality slides with some maps and a few photos from the cheap waterproof cameras.

Our first stop today is across from Chuar Temple at the mouth of the Little Colorado River, where its warm turquoise waters flow into the cold green Colorado.

From there we hike upriver a bit...

To a spot where we "Shoot the Train!"  It's fun but the rough travertine deposits, like a coating of sandpaper, require a somewhat infantile use of one's life-jacket to protect your backside...which Kirsteen and I model below.  She and many of the others chose to swim leisurely or float serenely back to the boats.  Alas, I would have also but for my camera bag.

Afterward we stop at a shady alcove for lunch...always with a variety of sandwich fixings, good bread, and snacks.  Food rule number one: mind your crumbs to prevent ants from overtaking campsites.

We float past the Pallisades of the Desert for miles.

Appropriately, it's about 110 degrees as we enter Furnace Flats.

Tonight we camp just above Unkar Rapid; its steady roar a reminder that we run our first big rapids tomorrow...and Unkar is just a warm up.  Hackey sack is popular this evening.

Angel Window can be seen in this silhouetted panorama of the North Rim.

The river rats scramble up a steep ridge to scout Hance Rapid.  Starting on a line somewhat right-of-middle, it took us three minutes to run the rapid.  Despite the hot weather, the chilly water had our teeth chattering by the end.

The small white patch on the distant canyon wall (below the left end of the red cliff) is Hance's old asbestos mine, for whom the rapid is named.  Also note the dark rock just below that white line of the red cliff...that is the entrance of the Inner Gorge!

We have arrived at the Inner Gorge and stopped for lunch

below the formidable crags of Vishnu schist.

Renee is often set upon the rocks.  She's one of the free-ride assistants on the trip...a friend of one of the guides, she gets a free vacation in exchange for working and learning the ropes of being a guide.  It's how many new guides are recruited.

A chunk of red precambrian granite, which runs in veins through the Vishnu schist.  These rocks are almost two billion years old!!

After one of our more precarious moorings, requiring a short scramble over sharp rocks, and then an easy 1/2-mile walk, we got to spend a couple of hours hanging out and cooling off at Clear Creek Falls.  The fall on the left provided the perfect massage!

The dam we built (bigger).

Weary dam builders take a long break.

An outcrop of quartz along the trail.

Camp Zoroaster is a long and narrow shelf of sand.

Rocks and pools at the river's edge.

Scorched rock and shrubbery across the way.

Tonight's chef, Howie, doing the boat dance.

To be continued...

Rafting the Grand Canyon - Part One

And so begins an epic series of photo journals documenting the trip of a lifetime!
Hi-res photo-fans can go here, but you won't get away from my monograms.

In June 1996, Kirsteen and I set off on a 13-day odyssey down the Grand Canyon with Arizona Raft Adventures.  There's little bad that you can say about any of the outfitters, but AzRA really did make this awesome adventure...with great guides and incredible food!

And so we begin at Lees Ferry...

Not our boats, but they sure made a pretty picture set against the Vermillion Cliffs.

These are our boats...four oar-powered rafts holding a guide and four passengers each, and one paddle-boat for six plus a guide.  This trip is human and river-powered all the way!

Reflections on the gauging station at Lees Ferry.

Navajo Bridge is 500 feet above the river.  Trivial factoid: a true cantilever bridge system,the two halves are not hard-connected in the middle.

Marble Canyon is 1000 feet deep by the time you reach Ten Mile Rock.

I've added this page from my photo album which shows our lunchtime stop and and swim-exploration of Silver Grotto.  Had to take one of the waterproof cameras to get this.

The paddle boat approaches North Canyon Rapid.

Howie's boat slips through pretty easily...

...while the paddle boat crew makes the most of it!

It's a spacious camp just below North Canyon rapid...but it turns out that bedding down near the rocks is a bad idea as they radiate the heat from the day.

I hiked to this grotto of twisted rock in North Canyon half-a-mile from camp.

Redwall Cavern is a massive undercut of the limestone in Marble Canyon.

Kirsteen and I agreed this section of Marble Canyon may have been the most scenic of all.

River guides, Jon and Howie.  Howie is a science teacher during the school year.  More on Jon below.

Our second camp is at the mouth of Buck Farm Canyon.  'Twas one of our hottest nights, but blowing sand negated any relief from those who tried to camp in the breeze.

As for scenery, this campsite was one of the best.

It's about 2000 feet to the top.  A bit disconcerting were the loud rifle-shot cracks as rocks plummeting from the cliffs above smashed onto the boulders below.

Their camp was a great photo-op but hot boulders and blowing sand made for some grumbling.

River guide, Dennis, on the morning routine.

This boulder field makes for an interesting still life on the years-old remnant of a violent debris flow.

The wake-up call, two blows from a conch shell, went out when the camp-coffee was ready; they didn't skimp on the quality...just use the ladle and don't stir the pot!

Extra hands stand by to help load the boats.

After a hot exposed climb into Saddle Canyon, the water is a welcome relief!  "Just stay wet!" was the trip-leaders advice--and he was right!  The trail ends at a beautiful cascade into a slot pool.



A shout for "Group shot in the slot!" was all it took to coax everyone back in for this river-rat family portrait.

Our beach on the Nankoweep delta.  The dinner show included peregrine falcons hunting for bats.  Rain threatened but it sprinkled only briefly.  It was cooler this and the next few nights.

Jon: paddle-boat captain, head cook*, and recent graduate in geology, entertains and informs with a multimedia presentation of the land.  The beer can is The Watchtower on the South Rim, Ren is hiding out in the Little Colorado River and the mound of sand is the Kaibab Plateau.  Well done!  *Ironically, the head cook is the only guide that doesn't have to cook...whut?  The head cook packs all the food, coolers and kitchen supplies and then unpacks what is needed for each meal.  It's quite a job of organization all by itself!

Whew, that's just the first three days!  To be continued...

Death of a Stranger

Fair warning:  This story was on my old website for years and is probably the most powerful piece of writing I've ever created...about a tragic day at the Grand Canyon back in the summer of '97.  I'd written a version of it in the following days but later Kirsteen showed me a debriefing written from her point of view, and I knew the story could not be complete without it.

Death of a Stranger

by Eric J. Anderson and Kirsteen E. Anderson

          Toroweap Overlook would, I think, qualify as the grandest view of the Grand Canyon, if not of all views everywhere. Out at the remote western end of the canyon on its north rim, it isn't a place that most tourists get to. Many people are deterred by 60-plus miles of gravel road across a very lonely strip of Arizona. But a few people know where they're going, and a few people do discover.
          I've made the trip to Toroweap three times. The first time, it took me five years to get there. That is, plans to include the visit on various trips never came to be—given the late snowstorm one year, just no time next time, and so on.
          It was worth the wait.
          Mere words cannot describe the experience of first walking up to that unguarded precipice. Standing on the edge of the inner gorge, 3,000 feet deep and barely a mile wide, no one can not feel the vertigo as their vision is pulled ever downward. The Colorado River can be seen for miles, providing fine views for the less courageous, though many people will risk a close-to-the-edge stance to see the river directly below. It's a move that takes control—and a certain faith that this part of the canyon won't become a little wider today.
          On that first trip, a camping buddy and I discovered Toroweap together. Braver than I, he was amused by my final crawl to the very edge. A full moon preserved our view throughout the night; with added features of a lunar eclipse and a little Pink Floyd to highlight the experience. By morning, I knew that I had found my altar—my place to contemplate the soul and define existence.
          On my second visit, I introduced close friends to Toroweap. Having had my moment, I relished in watching their first experience. We ate well that night, sat around the fire and toasted the fitting end to an adventurous trip.
          On my third visit, I introduced my wife to Toroweap. Her experience was the most powerful of all, though it wasn't what I had imagined it would be.
          It was the last night of what had been an ambitious, and testing, 3-week road trip. Arriving just before sunset, we snagged one of the two campsites at the overlook. Another young couple were quietly going about their routine in the other campsite.
          Knowing Kirsteen would be more prone to fear than awe, I was not surprised when she did not boldly stride up to the edge. And I sensed that she did not necessarily agree that this would have been a great place for a wedding, even if we could have gotten her mother out there.
          The sunset was magnificent. We slept well that night, better than we had for most nights of our trip.

 
“Excuse me.”
 
          I wake up. The sun is on the horizon. Pictures! Grab my camera. Wait. There's somebody out there...huh…did he wake me up? Kirsteen is stirring.
          “Excuse me, please can you help me?” There is a man standing outside the tent, his polite accented words in utter contrast to the distress on his face. “I think my girlfriend has fallen off the edge.”
          Kirsteen and I look at each other thinking there is no way he can be serious. “What?” I answer groggily. He says it again. And he is serious.
          The grief-stricken man paces as we dress and scramble out of the tent. No girlfriend in sight. He explains they were sitting near the edge, waiting for the sunrise. He went back to the car for a blanket and a cigarette. When he returned she was gone. There was no scream. Nothing but what he described as a distant sound of tumbling gravel—not enough to convince him, or us, that she had fallen. Did she just get up and wander along the rim? He looked for her. Is she hiding, is she lost? He had run both directions along the rim, searching, calling for her. She was nowhere. Then he had driven to the ranger station, seven miles away, but there was no one there. So he came back—it must have been an hour.
          An hour? I decide not to ask how dark it was when they were sitting so near the edge. He is frantic and doesn't know what to do.
          We have awakened to a surreal world. The only link to the reality of the situation is the woman's complete absence. We hadn't seen her face the night before but we had seen a she. And now she is not here. There is no way to see down the cliff where she would have fallen, not without risking ourselves. Within minutes we decide that I will drive to Fredonia, over 70 miles away, there being the nearest telephone I know of. Kirsteen will stay with the man, as we cannot simply leave him alone out here. He asks me to bring cigarettes, “I told her I would quit, but..." his voice cracks, "I can't...not today.”
          As I quickly unload supplies from the truck, I can't help but think to myself, “What if he pushed her? What if he's an evil lunatic? And I'm leaving Kirsteen...?!” But his grief seems genuine and there's no time to dwell on it. I leave, pretty sure that we're doing the right thing.

          So Eric is to drive for help. What do I do now? “Run! Get in the truck, drive as fast and as far as you can away from this horrible place,” my brain says. I glance at the man, weighing the haunted look in his eyes. How long would he be here alone? Would he trust us to bring help?
          The decision is made. As I watch our truck lurch slowly over the ridge, I have the sinking feeling that my lifeline has been cut—my last connection to a normal world where people go quietly minding their own business, and young women don't fall off cliffs.
          “Would you like a cup of coffee?” I ask.
          He looks up eagerly. “Yes. Yes, I'd like that.”
          As I busy myself making coffee, he curls up on the bench in a fetal position, his face buried in a towel, weeping steadily. I want to offer reassurance, but how to comfort a total stranger? The stock, “Everything's going to be all right,” won't cut it. Whatever happened, things most certainly are not going to be all right. I know the best I can do is to remain calm, hoping to temper his hysteria.
          As I pour coffee, he looks up out of his cocoon. “How far down is it? To the bottom.”
          “About 3,000 feet.” He looks confused. “About 900 meters.”
          “Ohhhhh. No one could survive that.”
          “No, but there are many ledges. She won't have fallen all the way to the bottom.”
          He looks hard at me. “Do you think she could be alive?”
          I can't meet his eyes. . . . “I don't know.”
          He gets up and walks to the edge, pacing slowly back and forth, staring down, down. Dear God, I pray, please don't let him do anything stupid. I walk halfway toward him, not sure whether to intrude on his grief, not sure what I'd do if he suddenly disappeared from sight. He doesn't seem suicidal. I'm sure that he's as afraid of the edge as I am. But he's not thinking very clearly, and the helplessness, the forced inactivity is weighing heavily on him.
          Eventually, he turns and walks back to his bench. We both sit down, and I give a silent prayer of thanks. Quiet again.
          A couple walk over the ridge, having come from the main campground about half a mile away, gazing in awe at the view and chatting happily. They're still in the normal world, oblivious to the emotional turmoil they've just walked into. The man walks toward us. “Excuse me, did you know somebody left a blanket and a walking stick by the edge? Are they yours?”
          “Please don't touch them. We think someone may have fallen over the edge, and we need to leave everything just where it is until the sheriff comes.” Even I don't believe what I'm saying.
          The couple look at each other, stunned. “Did you hear that? She said someone fell! ... Can we help?”
          I wish there was anything anyone could do. I want to do something too. The waiting is gnawing at my insides. “My husband has driven to Fredonia to get help. If there's anyone at the campground with a cell phone, and if it works out here, they could get help faster.” The couple scurry off on their mission.
          Alone again. He had hardly looked up from his towel. To break the silence I ask, “Do you know what you'll do now?”
          “What should I do?” he asks, obviously irritated.
          Okay, stupid question. I'll shut up now.
          We hear a motor. It's too soon…it couldn't be…but we both look eagerly at the ridge. Dale and Cheri Johnson have driven over from the campground with their cell phone. Dale climbs the low ridge above the lookout and circles slowly with the phone. No signal. They carefully search the drop-off around the blanket, but they can see no more sign of what happened to her than we could. The man says he keeps thinking she'll appear on the ridge, laughing at the clever practical joke she's played on us. But there is no sound of laughter, just the wind whistling up canyon and periodic heaving sobs.
          I go over to talk to the Johnsons, trying to keep my armor up against the waves of grief around the table. They tell me that the Bureau of Land Management station at Mt. Trumble—not 30 miles away—has a two-way radio. If only we'd known! They're driving out that way, and offer to call in the alarm from the BLM station. “Yes, that sounds like a good idea.”
          Dale glances over at the huddled mass at the table, then looks closely at me. “He's been like that the whole time,” I say.
          “Do you want us to stay?” He's weighing the suicide risk too.
          “No, it'll be all right. Just call for help.”
          Their truck, too, slowly lurches out of sight. The minute hand on my watch inches toward 8:00. I decide it can't have stopped after all.


          I run into a carload of visitors within minutes of leaving Kirsteen at the overlook. “Anybody have a cell phone?” Yeah—no signal. So much for modern technology. Twenty minutes and I'm at the vacant ranger station considering (a) there's probably a two-way radio in there, should I break in? (b) I probably wouldn't know how to operate the damn thing anyway. So I leave.
          The gravel road is in good shape most of the way and I make excellent time. But even with minding the quick pace, the drive allows for idle thinking, and that's the last thing I need to do. When music isn't enough I play an audio tape, the story providing moments of distraction.
          By the time I reach the highway, I'm starting to have trouble believing what I am doing. I have found myself dialing 911 a few times in my life, but nothing like this. My call will set into motion a dangerous and expensive rescue effort. What if she is already found and alright? What if it is a joke?
          The operator is silent for a moment. She is in Kane County, Utah, and is taken aback by a report from Toroweap. Recovering quickly, we proceed with morbid efficiency. “My guess is that it's a body recovery,” I tell her. She assures me that she will alert the proper authorities and I ask her to relay the message that I'm on my way back.
          My mission complete, I refill the gas tank and, oh yeah, cigarettes. I sit in the truck for a few minutes. It's 8:15.
          The return trip is slower, but still urgent in its way.


          A distant sound. We both turn and scan the skies anxiously. I'm sure it's an airplane, not a helicopter. Besides, there's no way Eric could have made it yet. ...but maybe, maybe. A small plane heads straight up the middle of the canyon. Sightseers! Every five minutes after that, the same sound again. Each time, I check my watch and look up. I know exactly what I'm going to see, but I seem powerless to stop myself. Damn, the skies are busier than Sky Harbor. I thought Babbitt put a limit on over-flights.
          I'm in the outhouse when I hear the unmistakable reverberation of a chopper at close range. At least 2½ hours have passed by external time. A lifetime by internal time.
          The man is already crouched at the edge, watching the helicopter sweep back and forth as it slowly rises to the rim. It disappears over the ridge and we hear the motor die.
          An orange jumpsuit appears over the ridge. They can't find her either. The woman in the jumpsuit starts asking questions, obtaining a complete description. He goes to get their passports. There it is in black and white. A smiling face with carefully curled hair, probably done specially for the photo. “We haven't seen her since sunrise. We think she fell.” he says. They're from Sweden.
          The woman asks him to try to sit calmly at the table and stay away from the edge. As soon as he's out of earshot, she asks me, “Has he been like this the whole time?”
          “Yes” I reply. I think to myself that he may be a little calmer now that help is here.
          “Did you hear anything last night or this morning? Loud voices, arguing, anything unusual?”
          “No. In fact, my husband and I commented on how quiet it was. It was almost like we had the place to ourselves.”
          “I have to ask these things, you understand?”
          I start to walk away.
          “What do we need to do for you?” jumpsuit says.
          “Huh?”
          “What's with your leg?”
          “It's cerebral palsy. There isn't anything you need to do for me.”
          “And you're out here camping? You certainly manage very well.”
          There's no real reply to that, and I don't need to go there anyway, not right now, with everything else going on.
          Orange jumpsuit asks, could we both write out everything we remember, while it's still clear? As if I'm likely to ever forget… but it's something to do. I rip some pages out of the register and grab a pen.
          As the jumpsuit starts cordoning off the area around the blanket with yellow “crime scene” tape, I hear another vehicle approaching. It's the Johnsons. They'd radioed from Mt. Trumble and been told the Park Service had already been notified. They came back to reassure us that my husband was headed back and help was on the way.
          The three of us have a conference with the orange jumpsuit. What happens now? “Well,” she says, “that's up to the lead investigator, ranger Michael Nash. Probably they'll take him over to Park Service Headquarters for questioning. If it's clear he didn't have any criminal involvement, they'll probably fly him back over here and drop him at his car.” She is serious, “We've done it before.” The rest of us quickly decide that we aren't leaving till we get a better answer than that.


          On the trip back to the overlook, I keep expecting an emergency vehicle to come racing up behind me. I even allow myself the luxury to stop and photograph some wildflowers, but no clouds of dust appear on the road near or far behind me. I'm not surprised when I arrive, though still impressed, to see a helicopter behind the ridge and rescue people scurrying about.
          I join everyone at the table under one of the few shade trees. It's a hot August day and there is already a small but quickly-growing thundercloud over the canyon. I give the man his cigarettes. He is grateful though looking as distressed as when I had left. Kirsteen is calm but I know the time has not been easy on her. I’m introduced to the Johnsons from Hurricane, Utah, and a few moments of idle chat follow. A break from the silent world for all of us.
          I check in with park-rescue ranger Nancy Mecham when she returns. Soon, she ties herself off, using the rope to lean and rappel over the edge to get a better look at the cracks and ledges directly below. Her bravery and concentration is very reassuring—we are in the hands of professionals. But they still can't find her.
          The thundercloud unloads a sheet of rain onto the far rim of the canyon. With a guilty thought and a convenient excuse, I leave the table to pack up our gear in the other campsite. Kirsteen comes over and I hug her out of view. I did not want to openly display my relief that it was not one of us who had fallen, with the other having to go through what he was going through.
          A moderate spitting rain lasts only minutes, it will not hinder the operation.


          Eric is back. I get up to help him break camp, hoping it will help me leave his nightmare world and return to the normal, everyday world just beyond the ridge. “Are you all right?” Eric asks, “You look pretty shell-shocked.”
          “It's just being around him for so long.” How do I explain that the grief is like a living thing? That it's contagious? That it's permeated my soul?
          “I know, I could feel the waves off him. That's why I got up from the table.”
          It's after 11:00 now, and still no sign of her. Nash has ordered a ground search as well, in case she did wander off and get lost. Still, nothing seems real.
          I go back to the table to distract him from the small crowd of lookyloos that has arrived. They're having the time of their lives. What better interruption of a routine camping trip than to find that Rescue 911 has come to life at your doorstep? Finally, I get up and go over to interrupt an idiot with an ASU ball cap and very penetrating voice. “Listen, it's that man's girlfriend they're looking for, and he really doesn't need to hear how far you think she fell.”
          ASU looks blankly over at the table. “Sorry…I didn't realize.”
          No. They're all still in the real world. Where people don't fall off cliffs except on TV. Where the viewers get the adrenaline rush without the pain. Where you feel secure that nothing that bad could ever happen to the people you love.


          One particular idiot has been hanging around near the edge since I got back. Nash and Mecham have enough to worry about without his testing Darwin's theory on natural selection. They have asked him several times to stay back, but he doesn't.
          Some time later, the idiot gives out a shout. I walk over, near where he and Mecham are sprawled on their bellies with their heads over the edge and scanning with binoculars. It takes him several minutes to explain where he sees the body.


          “Code 11 at 11:30 a.m. Can you confirm?” A voice crackles over the radio.
          “Yes, based on no movement and an 800 foot fall,” orange jumpsuit replies.
          I look at her. “Are you sure she's dead?” I ask blankly. Inside I know the answer, but it's all so surreal.
          “Eight hundred feet is eight hundred feet,” comes the uncompromising reply. I picture a fall off an eighty-story building onto concrete and I get some inkling what the body must look like.
          Orange jumpsuit is walking over to tell him the news. I start to hurry after her, somehow feeling the need to protect him from what she has to say. Eric's hand on my shoulder stops me. “It's best to leave them alone.”
          Yes. After all, we're complete strangers. We have no place in his private grief. I hear a wail like the death throes of a wounded animal from the table. “Just stay calm. Detach,” I tell myself.


           She's dead. That's all I need to know. Now all I want to do is leave. Kirsteen is being torn apart by his grief. I find it bad enough and I haven't been here half the time she has. I should feel guilty, and maybe I do. We don't know what is going to happen to him. Kirsteen fills me in on Mecham’s comment about leaving him here. Perhaps it is possible to take emotional detachment a little too far.
          Nash assures us later that there was never any question of leaving him alone on the north rim in a state of hysteria. He had radioed for a crisis counselor to stay with him while they try to figure out the safest way to recover the body. The counselor shows up about 2:00 and we leave her alone with him. She seems a very decent person.
          The helicopter has just returned from reconnoitering the site where the body came to rest. Mecham fills us in. There is no question that her spirit is gone, but swirling winds make it impossible to get her remains by helicopter. They are going to send hikers down.
          “Don't leave yet. You'll have to be interviewed and sign a formal statement,” Mecham tells us. So we all wait still longer. Half an hour later, she returns. “What? You're still here?” She radios over to Nash. What Kirsteen wrote on the back of the log sheet is sufficient. If she'd just sign and date it, we're free to go.
          The park service has already put his and her belongings aboard the helicopter. The Johnsons offer to drive their rental car back to St. George and the rangers agree to release it to them—the rental company will be grateful for not having had to come fetch it.
          We say our goodbyes.

          Sometime around 2:00 a.m. we arrive home in Tucson. It's over. We are both safe.

          We talked to Nash a couple of days later and learned that her body had been recovered late in the afternoon. The counselor stayed with the man until the next day, her day off, then drove him to Phoenix and saw him onto a flight to Sweden. We trust he, too, is safely in the loving circle of his family and friends.
          Nash offered to forward a card from us to the woman's family in Sweden, but we never heard back. We aren't sure if it made it, or if we should have even expected to hear back. Who are we but strangers? What price their closure for ours? And so we write.

          Life wouldn't have the same value if it weren't so fragile. One minute, the world is the same as always, the next minute, you're dead. True, most accidents have an element of stupidity in them—but a stone cast in that direction may not go far for many of us.
          While tragic, this event reminds us to treasure every day that we have together and to always take care when near the edge. We'll never be the same, but we can find peace with our memories. It does seem we were meant to be there, in that special place, at that terrible time.

For him, for us,

For Maria

Peace be her journey…and yours.

 

 

Speaking of crazy shit we did!  We got this idea around the campfire the previous night...the tent is empty (and tied to the rocks) but we wanted to photo-fake a campsite on the edge.

The World of "The Stanton Line"

A New Map of the Southwest!

Did anybody read the first three chapters of my novel that I posted a few months ago? (Kinda dropped that one, eh?)  Anyway, if you did read them, or want to read them, I'd like to ask you a few questions afterward.

But first, I want to show you a map...because what's better than a novel that comes with a map?!

Nope, that's not the southwestern USA that you're used to.  A current map is underlaid but there would be many differences in land use.  It's the early 1970s and my own world does not have an interstate highway system, though high-speed rail is coming in along similar routes.

You see, I just wanted to pretend to build a railroad through the Grand Canyon and then write a novel about it.  But how exactly would that happen?  The railroad, I mean.  What events would transpire to make it possible?  And why is it important for my characters?  These are questions a writer must ponder!

While action of the novel is mostly limited to the Grand Canyon Railroad between Moab and Las Vegas, developing my characters and their backstories necessitated other changes to the political backdrop and development of the west.  Here's a run from a few threads of history I tugged upon...

Utah Territory:  Fiercely independent since the resolution of the Mormon-Indian Wars at the turn of the 19th/20th century.  Utah claims all land west of (then north of) the Green and Colorado Rivers, and finally claiming land east of the Virgin River to its junction with the surveyed border of the Nevada Territory.  Unhappy with the resolution, Utah refuses to hold a referendum for statehood and so remains a territory.  Many rural areas, especially in the south, remain essentially un-governed for much of the 20th century.

Pueblo:  Skirmishes between Mormon settlers and various tribes of Indians come to a boiling point in both Utah and Arizona.  US soldiers enforce a "bloody ceasefire" campaign to stop the fighting while Roosevelt negotiates a surprising resolution and establishes the Indian State of Pueblo (with congressional representation but only a single non-voting senator).  Discovery of uranium in Pueblo and a push toward nuclear energy after WWII makes Pueblo a rich and powerful state at the time of the novel.  The boundaries of Pueblo are defined by the Rio Grande River, the watershed of the San Juan River, the Colorado River, and the Little Colorado...with a bit of straight-edge to get it back to the Rio Grande.

Gadsden Territory:  Pretty much as it was purchased, except, I took the angle out and got for Gadsden that great port he wanted on the Sea of Cortez.  Pissed off Mexico, I'm sure, but I'm probably not going to mention that.  I probably won't mention either that Baja California (sans Sur) gets snagged by the USA.  A couple of reasons I did this...I wanted the great port also, and I wanted to call it Rio Colorado, aka "Rio." (North America gets one too...besides, a little village with that name really is there.)  It's also the place that my main character is planning to run away to.  At the time of the story, Rio is a rough harbor city with a population near one million.  Lots of crime but also lots of opportunity.  Tucson is the territorial capital, a relatively quiet city of 30,000 or so.

Arizona:  I'm sorry, Arizona...I really messed you up!  But after cutting out some for Utah, a big hunk for Pueblo, and lopping off Gadsden, there just wasn't a lot left.  I also moved your capital to Flagstaff and made it the center of the hippy movement.  But, hey, I gave you some of New Mexico!

New Mexico:  ...just lost everything west of the Rio Grande. *ducks and runs away*

Colorado:  Well, here we have a winner...sort of.  A gain in territory at Utah's expense; and hard fought for by Colorado militia troops during the war.  Pueblo gets some land in the southwest corner.

Nevada Territory:  It's like the state of Nevada, on territorial steroids!

Republic of Texas:  As in independent.  Yeah.  Uh, I got no clue how that happened...but it sounds cool.  Looks like they got the Oklahoma panhandle too.

So, that's some of the setting of my novel.  But novels are about characters, the setting just helps get them where they're going.  So if I have whetted your curiosity, I will now link you back to those first three chapters in which I introduce my three main characters.

Preface
Chapter 1 - Running the Falls
Chapter Two - Moab Station
Chapter Three - Gaganga Chain

On the advice of a local author and mentor, I will probably not be publishing future chapters of my novel here on my blog.  But he was kind enough to read everything I had written and had many thoughtful questions, especially in regard to character development.  And so that is my question to you, what are your thoughts about these characters as you are introduced to them?

Bluelining: My Explorations of North America

One of my quirky habits is to document my travels.  No, I don't mean a journal...I mean a line on a map.  On almost every road map I own is highlighted, always in blue, every highway, bi-way and backroad I've ever driven on.  This has led me on an endless journey to find new roads to drive on...new to me, anyway.  When I'm exploring a new road, I call it "bluelining," and I can't imagine how many thousands of miles I've covered.  Last week I picked up another 15 miles of blue just an hour from home...it seems there is always a new scenic route to explore.

With the advent of GPS and topographic software many years ago, I was able to put my travels in more of a master file, as it were.  I certainly have gotten around:

These are my travels in the southwestern USA since I was 20 years old, when I moved to Arizona.  It must include a year's worth of camping days as well.

The four lines off the top of the map all make their way to Calgary with a cluster of exploration in the southern Alberta-B.C.-Montana area.  The stomping grounds of my youth with our annual summer round-robin of camping trips:  Banff, Jasper, Waterton, and Glacier National Parks; then toss in Dinosaur Provincial Park with our notorious expeditions into the Restricted Area (I'll have to blog about that), and a remote outpost on Bitteroot Lake in northwestern Montana (where I caught my first fish).  From Victoria Day to Labor Day.  Six weekends, done every other.  Every summer.  Thanks, Dad...that was one of the cool things about growing up.

Every August also included a two-week vacation, usually a tour somewhere in the western US.  I'd been to Arizona a half dozen times before I moved here.  The two exceptions were a trip up the Alaska Highway in 1969 and out to Cape Cod in 1972.  I was five years old on our trip to Alaska...I remember seeing Mount McKinley.  Also in that memory log is camping at Wonder Lake; I woke up needing to pee, then went about playing in the rocks since the sun was up.  Dad laughed and said it was 3:00 in the morning.  I was so confused.  Cape Cod was the only trip my Dad took us to see his family. (They did come to visit us a few times.)  We spent a few days in Jamestown, New York in the house where my Dad grew up.  I remember my Grandmother "Ganga" going on about Leif Ericson being an ancestor of the family, along with ties to the Mayflower.  Both claims have proven mythical at best, though we have a potential cousin relationship with Mayflower descendants in Salem.  Later in the trip, we toured New England and finally spent a few days in a cabin on the beach in Cape Cod.  The tide would go out for hundreds of yards there and we had a great time playing with hermit crabs.

In later years, my Dad became enamored with Mexico and made several springtime trips (driving from Calgary).  I missed a couple of weeks of grade nine for our trip down the west coast.  Oh...now there's a memory!!  We're camped right next to the beach in Manzanillo and I'm sitting on the sand looking at the stars and watching the surf when I kinda figure out...hey, how can I be watching the surf?  There's nothing around to light it up.  Whut?  So I run back to get my Dad...across some wet sand and...YOWZA!!  The sand sparkles under my feet!!  WTF??  Comes Dad with the answer...phosphorescent algae!  Ah...very cool.  So we sparkle-stomp on the wet sand for a while and watch them light up the crashing surf.  We also stayed in Guadalajara for a few days; easily my favorite city in Mexico...despite this incident which occured outside our rather well-fortified trailer park. (It was like a little rich-Gringo enclave with high walls, broken-bottle capstones, barbed wire above that, all grown over by very dense hedge.)  So we come out one morning and there's a small puddle of blood on the sidewalk, really more like a big collection drops.  Somebody got cut pretty badly (from the bottles?).  From that point, a trail of blood drops goes along the sidewalk and around the corner.  We know from a stroll the previous day that there is a medical clinic down that street.

The next year was Dad's most ambitious trip ever.  Five weeks...ten thousand miles.  We made it as far as Belize City (Tikal, in Guatemala, had been the goal).  Toured the whole of the Mayan ruins on the Yucatan Peninsula and we sweated a whole lot.  Oh yeah, me and Malcolm played Spin the Bottle with some cute local girls in Veracruz.  None of us spoke the other language well, but we still had fun.  Isabel, Nieva and her boyfriend Gustavo...which didn't stop her from making out with me when he was out of sight.  (And damn Dad that he wouldn't take the time to visit their home village the next day!)  The best part?  I missed FOUR WEEKS of grade ten for that trip!  Not that my teachers didn't give me all the necessary assignments to complete as homework.  My social studies teacher said go as far as you can...by the end of the trip I was a month ahead of the class.  Even better, that year the teachers went on strike a month before the end of the school year...and didn't go back until October!  That resulted in only a single math test (in trigonometry) counting for the quarter, and I got 100%!  Woohoo, the only time I ever saw that on my report card!  (Though first quarter English I got 16%...whoops!)

I'm digressing again.

Outside of Arizona, my densest concentrations of activity are in southern California, the Denver area, and southern Utah.  The former two are a direct result of marriage, as my in-laws are in San Diego, L.A., and Santa Barbara.  However, Kirsteen grew up in Boulder and has a lot of family that area.  All of them are close enough to drive to in a day, or to take a week with some four-wheeling in the San Juan mountains of Southwest Colorado.  As for southern Utah, well, do I really need an excuse to be such a fan of that incredible landscape?

And then there's Arizona.  There must be people that have seen more of it than I have, but I've never met them.  There isn't a time of year that you can't explore some part of this dynamic state.  From the western deserts in winter, to the mile-high chaparrels of spring and fall, to the summer sky islands of the southeast and the rim country, spanning central and eastern Arizona with America's largest stand of ponderosa pine.  Just pick your elevation and drive...there's always someplace to explore.

Alas, I have only been to four countries in this great world and have only one off-continent jaunt to Hawaii.  But I haven't done too bad...four of the Canadian provinces and the Yukon Territory.  36 of the US states, and 28 of the 33 Mexican states.  Dad used to count counties...I haven't got quite that anal about it.

Topping my off-continent bucket list would be Florence, Italy and New Zealand...though I'm still partial to an Alaskan cruise/train/Denali Lodge adventure thingy or a thorough tour of the Hawaiian Islands.  I promised Kirsteen Hawaii, but Alaska is the honeymoon we should have taken.  Alas, any of them would require a loan on my life insurance.