Hardhats and Sand Dunes

I started the day on Wednesday by hearing my mom say, "You should get up; it's 3:30." We had to leave by 4 in order to get to Page, AZ in time to go on a rafting tour of the Colorado River.

So I rolled out of bed and stumbled over to my computer. I had to write out the directions to get to Page since part of the road had collapsed and we had to take a detour. I took one look at the clock and said, "You looked at my phone clock, didn't you? That's two hours behind. It's really 1:30; go back to sleep."

Other than that minor catastrophe, the morning started off decently. We were able to see the entire blanket of stars when we went outside. We could also see the silhouettes of the elk grazing in the hotel yard.

There was a lot of "Are you sure this is the right way?" from my mom and sister when we finally did get going. I don't blame them; we had to go through the National Park in order to get to the right highway. They didn't like it very much when I said, "I don't know."

While en route, we got to watch the most beautiful sunrise over the eastern rim of the canyon. We also got to sit behind the most beautiful orange-and-white striped barriers for about 10 minutes. But other than construction and a bit of a kerfuffle at the end about which way to turn on S Lake Powell Blvd, everything went smoothly - a definite first for the Beckett clan. We even got to Colorado River Discovery's headquarters some 4 minutes early.


I am now able to boast that I have been on restricted government property heavily guarded by homeland security. However, I arrived in a bus loaded with other people who can also boast the same thing. On top of that, I was only there because CRD has an agreement with the government that they can use the access tunnel for Glen Canyon Dam. So it's not nearly as sketchy as it sounds.

This tunnel is two miles long, with several adits (windows) blasted through to the sides of the canyon. It has room for only one lane, though it is a bit wider at both ends. There are no lights inside the tunnel, and the grade is 8%. All in all, it's very interesting. I looked up the tunnel on the internet, and essentially all the government will say about it is that it is 2 miles long and not open to the public.

When we got to the end of the tunnel, Glen Canyon dam soared up overhead - 700 feet tall. We had to wear hardhats on the way to the dock for the rafts, since the government doesn't want rocks falling on people's heads. (Sounds reasonable.)

The actual rafting trip was superb. Nate, our guide, was funny and engaging. We had 18 people total on our raft, including two of the most precocious twins out there. They couldn't have been more than six years old, but I think they were five. The boy knew all about ospreys - do you? - and nearly everything else, effectively putting Nate out of a job. The girl, when questioned about how they knew all this stuff, replied in the most genuinely confused and matter-of-fact voice I've ever heard, "I read." (Of course you do. Don't all five-year-olds? I did, so I know the feeling of complete bewilderment when people ask you how you know this stuff, but most five year olds, in fact, do not read unless it's absolutely necessary.)

We stopped for a few minutes on a beach on the river. This was in order to go to the bathroom. Yes, the bathroom. They put free-standing stalls on a beach. I don't know what would possess someone to do that, but it was a good idea.

Past the bathrooms was a wall of petroglyphs - images cut into the rock by ancient and not-so-ancient peoples, including both Native Americans and cowboys who didn't know they were defacing a future National Park. (Joy says, "It's only fair for them to leave their marks, after risking their lives to explore the river." But I think it's a case of "Kilroy was here.")


Before I go on, you must understand that the water released from Glen Canyon Dam is a steady 47 degrees Fahrenheit year-round, since it's released from the very bottom of Lake Powell. We went wading in the river, and our feet quickly felt like blocks of ice. But the coldness showed its value when Nate hauled a bag full of cans of lemonade out of the water and passed them around.

The grandeur of the canyon is not something that can easily be described, or even photographed. It's too big, and too red, and too full of history. There's a deep, pervading sense of silence even when the motor of a raft is running.

We went around Horseshoe Bend and saw people up at the top taking pictures of us. They looked about three millimeters tall. I'm sure we looked just as small to them. Nate had us all yell "Hello!" on the count of three, but I don't think they heard us. The people camping on the other bank sure did, though!

On the way back, I decided to sit on the pontoon (we were allowed to!) instead of in the raft itself. My mom told Nate to try to get me soaked with the spray coming from the bow of the raft, but he didn't seem too interested in doing that. Until the end, when a huge wall of water came up to meet me and I had only enough time to close my eyes and mouth before being thoroughly drenched. He looked ridiculously pleased with himself before apparently remembering that this type of raft tour promised that no one would get wet.

 Let me tell you: 47 degrees is cold, even on a hot day. By that time we were back at the tunnel - and air-conditioned buses. I thought I would be grateful for the air conditioning; in reality, I could not feel my feet because they were so cold.

We entered the tunnel and were zipping along when we saw the one thing no one in a one-lane tunnel wants to see: headlights. Since they had come almost two miles and we had just started, the bus began to back up until the tunnel widened enough for the car to squeak past.

We headed back to CRD headquarters and were pleasantly surprised to see that we had a free Bistro lunch. We were, nevertheless, glad we had packed our own lunch as well, as nothing gets you quite as hungry as a large expanse of water and a tremendously hot sun. They also gave us directions to get to the kayaking place.

I wouldn't say that the kayak tour on Lake Powell was necessary, but it was fun. Our mom has always said that she will never get into a kayak or canoe; she hates them and they hate her. But this time she did get in - successfully, no less - and proceeded to kayak a distance that distance-challenged Joy says was either 2 or 4 miles. I, myself, have no idea how long it was, because on the way there I was busy trying to just keep my kayak straight. (I was the only one, besides the two guides, who was in a solo kayak. Everyone else had a partner.) On the way back, I was busy squinting with one eye because my sunscreen had gotten in the other and I was having a painful allergic reaction.

Lake Powell is a water-filled canyon. Since it's warmed by the sun, the water on top is about 78 degrees - a welcome difference after the river water! The deepest point is about 400 feet. We were in an area that was only about 100 feet deep. Therefore, I put the camera in a dry-bag that was strapped to the kayak. There was no way I was going to find it if it happened to drop over the edge.

We stopped for about half an hour to swim by a little island - really the top of a canyon formation. Joy somehow managed to drop one of the cameras in the water. We are not sure how this happened, since it had been secured around her neck. She rescued it immediately, of course, but it was effectively ruined. (Incidentally, this is the same camera that has been living on borrowed time ever since she dropped it a couple of years ago into a small, water-filled receptacle generally found in powder rooms and NOT in kitchens.) The SD card was fine, though, and I was able to save all the pictures we had taken. Later, when I tried to take it apart and see what was wrong with it, I found it water-logged and rusted. Even without batteries in it, it electrocuted me twice. (Is that supposed to happen?)

Anyway, we tried to go into Slot Canyon, but there was too much gunk in the water. One of the other kayakers said it was like trying to paddle through chocolate soup. We turned around, and stopped by another island to rinse out the kayaks and get the nasty-smelling goop off of ourselves.

By this time, we were starting to get the hang of kayaking. None of us flipped over! We even managed to not be the last ones.

But our adventure was far from over. We had parked on the beach of Lake Powell. Beaches mean sand, and lots of it. We had to drive uphill in all that sand. Being Becketts, we got stuck. In all of two seconds a man in an SUV drove up, attached a rope to our axle, and tried to pull us out. We were still stuck. One of the ladies in our group got a delighted, evil grin on her face, asked to borrow our camera, and proceeded to take pictures of our mishap. Eventually, of course, they got us unstuck, because obviously I am sitting at home writing this.

On the way back, we had to wait at construction for 30 minutes, waiting for the pilot car to come get us and lead us to through the construction. We were just happy it was on the way back, not on the way there. We had barely made it as it was!

We did manage to see the sun set, though. It was spectacular, even though it wasn't really over the canyon.

Finally, our longest day on vacation ended. By the time I had finagled the waterlogged SD card into saving its pictures, I had been awake for 22 hours. That is why I am posting this now, instead of then.

And that, gentle reader, is how NOT to do a rafting tour. I suggest going on one, but not quite like that. Later on, I'll post my list of ways to have a great vacation, Beckett style.

Mercy in the Mundane

I fully intended to write a post about yesterday – yesterday. And I fully intended to write a post about today – today. But it looks like yesterday’s post will be written today, and today’s post will be written tomorrow. 

Yesterday was a day full of God’s guidance and provision. Sometimes guidance is best seen in the little things – those things that come to fruition in a short amount of time, and there isn’t much opportunity to wonder why things happened the way they did. That doesn’t mean that little things have more guidance; it just means it’s more obvious. 

Little things happened all day yesterday. First, we woke up late – which never happens, especially out here where everything is two hours earlier than we’re used to. We had been planning on visiting the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest, but 3 hours one-way seemed a little bit much. (Even for overambitious souls like ourselves.) So we decided to stay in the Grand Canyon National Park area for the day.

Secondly, we decided to take the free shuttle bus to different lookout points farther out on the south rim. This bus line had been closed when we tried to get on it for the past few days, due to nearby lightening storms. But yesterday it was open, so naturally we visited all nine points.

Thirdly, around the third-to-last point, I started feeling sick. I don’t do well in intense light or high heat, so I was feeling faint. I had black spots encroaching on the corners of my field of vision. I had to get back on the bus right away and head back.

Fourthly, I felt better after we got on the bus, so we saw the remaining two points. When I started feeling weird again, we left.

And then everything became apparent. There were nasty lightening storms where we would have been had we gone with our original plan. So they closed and evacuated the entire West Rim, which we had just been seeing. My sickness let us see absolutely everything we wanted to, before it got dangerous to be out there.

Then it rained. It was the first big rain of the monsoon season, complete with fantastic lightening and even more impressive thunder. And we were safe, all because we had woken up a little late, and I had felt sick.

It doesn’t sound so wonderful when it’s typed out in cold, black-and-white letters, but we nonetheless saw the kindness of God very clearly yesterday, in the little things. In uncomfortable situations. In the orchestration of a day so perfect we could never have planned it that way ourselves.

Helicopters and Sunsets

There is simply nothing like a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon. We went on one yesterday - our first helicopter ride ever. It made the Canyon come alive and become 3D. Before that, it looked so much like a painting or real-life photoshop that it was unnerving. (Incidentally, I think that's why people don't mind getting so sickeningly close to the edge: it just doesn't seem real that there's a 4,000 ft. drop beneath them. My mom says that it's a case of "shinny, shinny, shinny, shinny, bump, bump, bump, splat.")

We took off from the Grand Canyon Heliport, flying over Kaibab National Forest on our way to the canyon. A few minutes into the ride, the canyon became just visible over the trees before suddenly unfolding before us in all its glory. We swooped over the South Rim and over the mighty Colorado River, which looked like a shining green ribbon.

Flying over the canyon, we saw many different formations, most of which we hadn't been able to see previously. We saw the confluence of the Colorado and Little Colorado Rivers. The Little Colorado is the bright turquoise.

Then, we flew over the North Rim, seeing how much greener it was than the South Rim. There was a clearing where we could have seen wild buffalo, had they chosen to show themselves. But they didn't.

Finally, we flew right over our hotel, and back to the airfield. It was a wonderful experience, and I highly recommend it for anyone wanting to really experience the canyon. I'll check back in tomorrow and let you know if a rafting/kayak tour is a must as well, or if it's not absolutely necessary.





I wasn't feeling too good after the helicopter ride, and, interestingly enough, it wasn't motion sickness that did me in; it was too much heat the day before. But it turned out for the best, anyway: since we were all tired and took a nap, we could stay out to watch the sunset. It wasn't spectacular, and it wasn't what we thought it would be. However, it was also over the Grand Canyon, so who are we to complain? It was great.

Joy said something interesting yesterday. She compared Solomon's temple to the Grand Canyon. Keep in mind that Solomon's temple was only about 111,650 cubic feet, but a rough estimate of the Grand Canyon is around 386,115,840,000,000 cubic feet. That means it's roughly 3,458,269,950 times larger than Solomon's temple. And then she referenced this verse:

"Thus says the LORD: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool; what is the house that you would build for me, and what is the place of my rest?" Isaiah 66:1.

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” Isaiah 6:3.

"grandness" vs. "Grandness"

We went to the Grand Canyon today. For the longest time, it seemed like we were nowhere special - just following a plain paved trail in the middle of a dry and fairly mundane desert forest. (It's mundane because if you've seen nine square feet of this desert forest, you've seen every other square foot of it on earth.)



And then, ahead of us, we saw a wall of rock, and a gorge opened up ahead.

 Let me tell you this: pictures just don't do it justice. It really is grand.

Typical "Foolhardy Person"

The National Park Service says to stay at least 6 feet from the edge at all times. I have no problems with that, being as terrified as I am of heights. (It's a useful fear to have, so I think I'll work on reducing it without removing it entirely.) But other foolhardy souls seem to delight in getting as close to (or beyond) the edge as possible. It's a horrible feeling to see a human being precariously close to a plunging gorge. My stomach did weird flips the entire time anyone stood more than 1 foot from the edge.We knew that it's instinctive to grab at anyone falling, and we didn't want to be taken with someone if they did fall, so - outstanding humanitarians that we are - we hightailed it to a different part of the area as soon as anyone got too close.

And I realized that that is exactly the feeling I get when I know that someone is willingly, knowingly, and actively pursuing the drop into Hell. However, in that case I do what I can to bring them back, or at least I try.

There is simply nothing like bigness to impress upon your mind the awesomeness of God. The sheer size of the canyon is overwhelming, but to realize that the Being that created it is so big that He's sizeless is something Grand indeed.

Of Tourist Traps, Velveeta Cheese, and Edgar the Elk

Greetings from Arizona!

Yes, that is my picture. And it's not even the Grand Canyon - it's Red Rock State Park, just past Sedona.

I suppose you can gather from the title that yesterday was full of very different experiences. It began at 6 AM, since our internal clocks have an annoying tendency to not let us sleep past that time regardless of vacations. It didn't end until almost 10PM here - midnight at home.

 It's fitting that I should have called this blog my misadventures. Of course, we took US Airways here. But they're going through a merger and they sent us up and down O'Hare (bags in tow) until we finally managed to get to the right gate. That doesn't sound so terrible, and it isn't, but O'Hare is not small. Furthermore, it is NOT self-explanatory.

So by the time I got on the plane I was glad to just sit down. I know you're expecting a list of what went wrong with our flight, but there were no real problems and we arrived in Phoenix safely. Our stuff was flown with us, but we didn't see it in Phoenix. Joy has never been on a "moving sidewalk" (you know those flat escalator-type things at airports?). So my mom decided that she would walk alongside and Joy and I would walk on the moving sidewalk. It reminded us of the suspender joke, which, if you have never heard, you can ask us about when we get back.

The gist of the thing is that we arrived in Flagstaff undamaged and undaunted. AND with all of our stuff, which is a real bonus.

So far, so good. Even the car rental went off wonderfully. And we only got semi-lost on the way to the Walmart (nor really lost, just a few panicky minutes), and the Subway was delicious and we found everything we wanted to buy at Walmart except apples. (Incidentally, this is where the Velveeta cheese comes in - we're planning on living on PB&J sandwiches, and cheese sandwiches, if the food here proves prohibitively expensive.)

We drove through winding roads with absolutely no guardrails and enormous dropoffs on the way to Oak Creek Canyon - a state park some thirty minutes south of Flagstaff. On the way there, we saw rocks that looked like a Moorish castle in Spain. We couldn't get to Oak Creek Canyon, though, because there had been tremendous fires and there was danger of flash flooding. So we passed that up, and went through Sedona - THE most tourist-trappy place I've seen in all my born (and unborn) days. It really looked like somebody photoshopped a nice background onto a travesty of shops and 50's diners.

We drove through Sedona and found ourselves in the most beautiful assortment of red rocks imaginable. Naturally we pulled over to the first available lookout point and took entirely too many pictures.

And then we drove three hours to our hotel. It rained. Poured is more like it. I'm not sure why, but I thought Arizona was arid and hot. I have been thus far pleasantly surprised.

When we got to the hotel, there was an elk in the front yard, munching on grass. I named him Edgar Elk, personally. For some reason elk running amok is perfectly normal here. They let them graze all they want on the hotel grass, but the manager watches to make sure they don't get too close to the road. "When they do," he said, "I just shoo them back." There are so many weird things about that statement.



Now I am in my nice, cool hotel room. It's much too fancy for the likes of us, but we've made up our minds to enjoy it thoroughly while we're here. (Speaking of fancy, why do we need two sinks in one hotel room? His and hers?)

Of Canyons Grand and Memories Old

“It was hard work, took a long time,
but I dug it myself, with a pick and a shovel.
If you want to know what I done with the dirt,
just look south through a clearin’ in the trees
at what they call the San Francisco Peaks.”

- John Hance, early Grand Canyon guide

We never went anywhere much when we were little – first we were too busy trying to survive in a gang neighborhood, then we were too busy enjoying the safety we had outside the gang neighborhood. We would go to museums on free days, but, except a trip to the Field Museum to see the Titanic (and touch it, in my case – I didn’t realize I wasn’t allowed to since I couldn’t read yet), we went nowhere.

That has changed in recent years. We visited relatives when Joy got out of college, and then again in 2012. We did something unprecedented last year and gallivanted off to Carlsbad Caverns without seeing a single relative. Now we’re off to the Grand Canyon – something Joy has wanted to do since she was little.

I tell people we’re making up for lost time now that we can appreciate things. That’s not strictly true; I’ve been able to appreciate things as long as I can remember. But since I didn’t have the endurance required for a full afternoon at the zoo, I would have died at the Grand Canyon.

We’re hoping that it’s as grand as we’ve been told. (If not, I’ve just spent the last week packing – or, more accurately, yelling at my sister – unnecessarily.) We’re hoping we don’t fall over and go kaput from the heat. (That’s the scientific term – “go kaput.”) We’re hoping we can survive after waking up at 3 in order to go kayaking on the Colorado River. We’re also hoping that we have air conditioning in our hotel room.

Above all, we’re hoping that we don’t run out of gas, or get abducted by aliens, or get lost in a Native American reservation, or anything else that we almost did last year. 

(No joke, not even the aliens - we arrived in Roswell during the alien festival.)