Rafting the Grand Canyon in 5 Photos

Preserving memories with words and pictures

Rafting with my family through the Grand Canyon was a life-changing experience. Oh, I’m still the anxiety-ridden, stressed-out mom I was before — but for eight days I felt released from the patterns and routines that I both rely on for consistency, and trap me into being a middle-aged resentful woman who feels like she is never enough.

So I’ve chosen five representative photos to help me preserve the trip in my memory and imagination. Wherever we go we take ourselves — both the best and worst parts. But sometimes if we are lucky, when we travel we get to see a wide-angle view of this good earth and our precious time here — and maybe we are even able to re-imagine how we relate to ourselves, our planet, and our communities.

The first picture, above, was taken in the evening. The shadows and light playing on the canyon walls made me feel safe, at peace even. The rock walls were formed over millions of years, and my eight days in the canyon didn’t even qualify as a sneeze in time.

In the same way that kids feel secure when parents set clear boundaries, I felt secure between the boundaries the walls created — which, perhaps counterintuitively, made me more open to play.

Little Colorado

One of the treasures of the Grand Canyon adventure is the Little Colorado, an ice-blue stream that feeds into the Colorado River. We hiked up the stream, and our guide gave the kids blow-up toys to float down.

Meanwhile, the adults wore their life jackets like diapers, with their legs fitted through the armholes, and floated down on their butts. It was goofy and fun.

While the stream reminds me of the color of glaciers, it’s actually the perfect swimming temperature.

In day-to-day life I forget to play, at the same time, my oldest, pictured above, is barreling her way out of childhood. I love this picture because it captures her as a kid, looking like a kid, on a blow-up inner tube. She could be any age in this photo. It reminds me that play is possible, no matter how old my kids are— I just have to keep myself open to it.

Deer Creek

The hike up to Deer Creek was vertical and hot. My youngest stayed behind to play in a waterfall, while my husband, older daughter, and I scrambled over rocks and shrubs and walked a ledge to arrive at this scene. On the way, there were very old (thousands of years?) child-sized hand prints on the rock. The place is considered sacred by indigenous peoples, and it inspired awe and silence in me. It felt like an outdoor cathedral.

As a young person, my dad would often take me on adventures with the statement, “You have to see this place! It’s incredible!” I thought about my dad and how he would have loved this place, how he would have impressed on me its magnificence. In that way that sometimes you feel the presence of someone whom you love, who is no longer a part of this earthly adventure, I felt my dad. I wanted to stop time and call him and return his words to him, “You have to see this place! It’s incredible!”

Instead, I took in the impossible trees growing beside the fresh water, and I thought about the flow of time and the life force that connects us all.

Campsite Memories

This might be my favorite photo from the trip because it juxtaposes the amazing canyon wall against the minutiae of our human lives. We loved that natural counter to organize our things…until we realized that scorpions also thought it was a good hang-out zone!

We slept at a different campsite each night. Which meant packing and unpacking every day, which meant everything was covered in sand, and certain standards were lowered or disappeared entirely.

I went to sleep at night feeling the nearness of my family, the rise and fall of my kids’ breaths, and trying to remember all the highlights from the day. I went to sleep feeling oh-so lucky to be alive, to be in this body at this moment with my family and with the wild kindness of the people we were adventuring with.

Awake in the Middle of the Night

The last night I didn’t want to go to sleep. My husband and I stayed awake whispering and watching shooting stars. I tried to keep my eyes open, to stretch our last hours of the trip out as long as possible.

I woke up at 3:00 am to a silent campsite. The stars had mostly vanished, but in their place, the moon took prominence in the skyline. I sat up, grabbed my flip-flops and camera, and headed down to the river.

It’s not uncommon for me to be awake at this hour at home, and I have often enjoyed trying to capture the middle of the night sky when everyone else is asleep.

That night was no different. Bats flew over my head, and the river made the confident sounds of running downstream, sloshing over rocks and pushing its way into the future.

I tiptoed around taking pictures.

Satisfied with my imperfect photos, I crawled back into my sleeping bag and whispered a quiet thank-you to the universe.

Final Thoughts

This is how I’d like to re-imagine life post-Grand Canyon:

Our time on earth is brief. We know this and we take ourselves seriously and our responsibilities (building a life, raising a family, working) fill most of our waking hours. I spend a lot of energy feeling guilty for what I’m not doing: If I’m spending time with my kids; I feel like I should be working, and vice versa.

But maybe there is a way to submit to the day at hand, to enter the river of life, willing to be surprised and relinquish control. To be present and surrender to joy, by letting the personal debris of life (bills, chores, to-do lists) claim less significance in my mind — to make room for fun, to center my thoughts on the ways I am connected to the planet and my community, and to cherish the abundance, while also acknowledging the earth’s limits and my limits.

Maybe, just maybe.

I’m still a work in progress, just like those huge rock walls that continue to be formed and weathered and sculpted by the water and the elements.

What are your favorite travel memories? How do you preserve them? Have you taken a trip that left a mark on your heart? I’d love to hear about them in the comments or link to a story!

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