Cataract Canyon & New June Music

My husband is a boatman and drives the snout boat into Cataract Canyon and Glen Canyon 6 days a week with 3 different sets of customers. I was one of them on this Memorial Day trip, along with Corey's parents. We had a fabulous time and I am so glad that I went..facing my fear and all.

The photos are not in order of the moments which transpired, because who has time?! Not I said the little red hen. But as you see up top..these are the boats docked at our camp. (we set up camp soon after the mighty RAPIDS)
Oh! Here is the cute little sign that we came to after about 5 hours of boating in "not rapidy" water. We are about to enter...the DANGER zone. It really is quite dangerous people. If you fall out or the boat flips...very very dangerous.
Corey is amazing! What an amazing river guide. He was so focused and serious most of the time..a lot different than when he's home. He means binez. Here he shut off the motor to talk to us peeps about the white line that was formed along this here mountain area and why it was white. (don't ask. I don't remember. Sorry Hon)
Me and my wonderful mother-in-law Elaine. We had to wear raingear even when we weren't in rapids because the spray from the front of the boat gets ya...wet...we were pretty wet. I don't know what I would have done if I didn't have my MIL and FIL with me. I sat between them when we went through the rapids.
Oh. And okay. This is food. There is nothing sexier than men (well, my man) cooking something beautiful for me to eat. I was ravenous after the shock my body went through worrying about the rapids before the actual rapids.

Is it weird to talk about food right before you talk about this?:
This is The Groover. It's a mighty force. And Erik here is the "other" boatman. They set up this porta-toilet not too far from camp behind some boulders. They even set up a hand washing station where everyone can see it, with a blue bag attached. If the toilette is not occupied the blue bag should be visible. If you are occupying the facilities, then you gently place the bag behind the "sink". It was fun. And I wasn't even nervous to use it whilst hearing everyone talking back at camp. Well, I did get a bit nervous when some folks decided to play a game where they had to stand higher up on a hill...in view of you know what.
One of my most memorable moments was upon awakening at 7am-ish and going to visit The Groover. Above is a photo of the view I see while sitting..in that "special place". I wish I saw this while sitting in every "special place" I have to visit. It was very peaceful and..um....relaxing.

There were a few dark menacing clouds but they didn't rain on us (at camp). We did get some hail as we were going through Big Drop 1 (1st big rapid) which made it even more exciting! Okay.....so to talk about the rapids a bit. They were fun. And I found myself wanting to do a couple of them over again.

Before we head through the whitewater-y rapido's (they are only about an hour stretch of this whole 2 day trip), Erik gave a safety talk to prepare us in case of a worst case scenario. Now let me tell you. I have never never never been so scared in my entire life. Never. After that sweet talk, my heart was pounding so fast and hard I thought I was going to die. I felt like bawling. Not just crying. Bawling. Felt like it. I didn't. And I thought I was going to hyperventilate. And amongst all this angst, I had to try to finish my chicken salad pita. Difficult.

Corey saw my face and knew. He looked me square in the eyes and said "You're going to be okay. It will be fine. I'm going to run them perfectly." So on went my life vest along with my mousy-looking face & twittery heart...and off we went.

As we were heading into the Deadly Canyon of Funride (I only say deadly because..well...people have died), I started singing.."you are my sunshine, my only sunshine." Mostly to be funny, but as the words were coming out it sounded kind of eerie. My father-in-law laughed. I like him.

It was like a roller coaster. It was really super fun. Corey is great. Really really (really i like the word really) great and I love him and thank him for taking me and taking care of me. (i like the word and) I don't know if I'll do this particular river run again..but I am now not so afraid to do others.

Me and cute Elaine after escaping a wild dust storm that blew through camp. We're hunkering down.
(Corey's Dad being his goofy self.)

There's quite a bit more pictures...and documenting. Day 2, going through Glen Canyon was gorgeous, absolutely gorgeous! So there may be more. I hope you don't get bored.

This post brought to you by the words: rapids, and, and really.

-New songs on my playlist for the month of June!! Yay! (more added as the month progresses) (if you still want to hear my May playlist all you have to do is click on my profile in Imeem and there they will be. ?'s? No? Yes? K then.)