The Grand Canyon (Day 5) - Aa-chew!!!

The following post is from the journal I kept of my recent adventure upon a 21-day private river rafting trip on the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon from Lee's Ferry to Diamond Peak (about 230 miles) that took place between April 18th and May 8th, 2012

April 22, 2012 

I think my body is trying to get rid of any and all issues during the past 24 hours. First, it was the puking incident at dinner last night. Then this morning I wake up and start having severe allergies. Basically, my nose will not stop running. It's a freaking waterfall of snot! Because of this I'm sneezing, blowing snot rockets, sounding funny when I talk, you name it. It's horrible, but I'm determined not to let it ruin my day nor the adventure. I took a Zyrtec allergy pill earlier today. After a while nothing changed so I panicked and decided maybe it would be a good idea to take a Sudafed. This was probably not the best decision I've ever made because I soon became "loopy" and on top of that I continued to sneeze and have to blow snot rockets! Now I'm basically drugged up and still having my little allergy attack.

It continues all day and I forced myself to not let it stop me from any activity. At one point I have make an announcement to everyone to please stop saying "bless you" after every sneeze because I'll probably be sneezing several hundred times more today.

As for the river goes, we finally seem like we are becoming a better oiled machine. We're definitely more organized and everyone seems to be figuring out what they're good at or what they like to do task-wise. Butch seems to have taken charge as the leader a little more and we got a much earlier start this morning at around 8 a.m. We totally charged President Harding Rapid first thing and then hiked the trail leading up Saddle Creek Canyon. This was a new spot for both Robert and I and if I hadn't been sneezing and drunk-like I think I might have enjoyed it. At the top the canyon narrows and there is a slot waterfall. We stop and have lunch at this spot and soon we learn that there's a rattlesnake hanging out in the water only about 10 feet away from our picnic. We leave him alone and he leaves us alone.

After Saddle Creek we settle on camping at the 50-Mile mark popularly called Dinosaur campsite because of a rock up on the canyon rim high above that kind of looks like a T-rex. Since we make camp earlier in the day it's super nice to have plenty of time before dark. Robert and I even went exploring up a wash where we find some new types of rocks not seen yet on the trip. It's quartz rocks and I think Robert and Athena have started their collection to bring home.

After our little adventure Robert, Athena and I take a shot at making dinner for everyone. This was our first time making dinner and the adults (or older members of our party) get to chill out and have a drink. Making dinner was fun and I look forward to doing it again. I'm not sure about making breakfast because I'm definitely not the earliest riser amongst our group.

It's getting dark quick and I don't want to write under my LED headlamp because we're starting to experience these annoying non-biting bugs called "midges" and they seem to overwhelm you if you have your light on once it's dark. In my previous two trips down the river I've never experienced a bug problem. I've been told these little suckers have a short life span and I guess we've timed it just right because they're everywhere. I hope they all die soon! So I'll close for now, probably go have some wine (too much wine with my west coast family around) and relax.