It’s all downhill from here.
It’s an almost universal truth that on all backcountry adventures and most bike rides, at some point someone says that phrase. For the uninitiated, it can be a sigh of relief that is ultimately dashed once that next uphill slaps them in the face. To those who are crusty and know how the world functions, it’s a joke. They know that there is always an uphill coming. Until you are standing at the end with no reason to move again, there is always another uphill.
That is unless you happen to be floating a river. By nature, rivers, and water, in general, flows downhill. It’s just how it works. You don’t put in on a river and bump into an uphill that you have to paddle up to continue. No, the only paddling you have to do is to control your boat, move faster or once you get bored, spin 360s to your heart’s content. It is literally all downhill. No joke, no catching you off guard because you thought you knew where you were, but happened to forget about that one hill that pitches up and almost kills you because you are so spent. No, it’s really all downhill. It has to be.
Of course, I speak of floating rivers which are completely different than floating rivers with the Alliance. Floating rivers with the Alliance inevitably will contain some uphill. I don’t know why, but that’s just the way things have always been and being a betting man, I’d bet they stay that way for some time. It’s as close to a universal truth as the fact that water flows downhill and hence rivers will, too. Any adventure with the Alliance at some point will go straight uphill.
The Alliance procured packrafts about a year and a half ago coinciding perfectly with one of the wettest springs this desert has seen in a while. We had after work floats. We had impromptu weekend floats. All culminating with our float down the Escalante River which is still one of the best things I have ever done. To say we were spoiled that first year would be accurate. This year has been the exact opposite. Up until this past weekend, we had paddled on lakes and a short stint of the Colorado that flows into a lake. All those desert rivers we enjoyed are too low to float.
The San Juan became a thing due to that dryness. It’s a desert river that flows, not only does it flow, but the reservoir upstream must keep it flowing due to the endangered fish that lives within its banks. We all wanted needed a float. The Planner got planning and scored us some permits. The Alliance would be floating. We would put in at Sand Island and take out at the Honaker Trail.
I’m not good at easy.
I do easy about as well as I do yard work. For those uninitiated in the ways of the Alliance, I’m really, like superstar really good at not doing yard work. It’s not that I don’t enjoy coasting or a good reward at the end of my efforts, it’s more that I need the struggle. I’ve found, the older I get (I aged 10 years in two weeks this year so, I am old) the more I need to find that line, to push my limits, to see where my legs can take me. It’s not that I can’t enjoy the immediacy of what surrounds me and relish in the solitude, it’s that I want that plus sweat dripping down my nose, my legs screaming at me to stop and a back that is breaking under the weight of whatever it is I’m carrying. I need to punish myself because in that moment of my body trying to stop, that’s when a smile creeps across my face, suddenly everything in the world makes sense and I just keep going.
Easy is not what I’m searching for. I don’t want to get home and tell about sipping pina coladas on a beach while some guy that would much rather be somewhere else is serving me whatever I want. I have no need for vacations. I’m seeking adventure. Adventure hurts. It’s probably the reason that there is always an uphill. I like going up.
No, I’m not good at easy.
Perspective. When you are floating a river, almost all your pictures will be from river level looking across the water at others sitting on the same level as you. It’s not that it’s a bad perspective, but it can get boring. We need contrast in our lives, or at least, I do.
Our contrast was the Honaker Trail.
After three days of barely having to paddle, we took everything we had brought including all the random extras we had allowed ourselves because we were floating, not packing, and somehow stuffed it into our packs. Extra oars, espresso maker, extra stove, all the food that we thought we might want, but ended up not eating, a towel, and of course, that poo box we’ve been toting around all weekend. It all went in and then we went up.
As a ratio, I took more pictures on that sub-two-mile hike than I did on any other part of the trip. A change of perspective.
The dirty river from afar just looks like a river. The Goosenecks that this section is famous for don’t exist until you are above the flow. You can’t tell you are going around, almost in circles, until you can see where you were from above. As my mother-in-law put it, “I thought you were in the Goosenecks.” Yes, we were, but it’s impossible to tell from the photos taken from the river.
P. L. and R.