Running Colorado's rapids means undergoing unrapid process first

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. -- There are only two kinds of Grand Canyon oarsmen and -women, according to a saying among professional Colorado River guides: Those who have flipped a raft in one of the canyon's hungry rapids and those who will.

During a private trip at the end of March, oarsman Shawn Rohlf, a veteran of eight seasons in the Grand, made the dreaded transition while piloting an 18-foot raft through Crystal Rapid.

The current drove the edge of Rohlf's raft up a rock wall on the left side of the river, pinning one of the oars. In an instant, the raft was vertical, fast approaching the point of no return. The force of the river bent the oar's paddle blade against the rock before the plastic splintered.

Rohlf, a San Diego folk musician, mistook the cracking noise for the sound of his banjo meeting its end. But he quickly had more pressing business -- like survival -- as the flipping raft pitched him and his sole passenger into Crystal's violent and frigid wave train.

In the excitement of running one of the Colorado's most notorious rapids and rescuing its most recent victims, Rohlf and his passenger, his companions forgot the unspeakable beauty of the place. At this point, the river cuts to the 2 billion-year-old basement of the Colorado plateau. Its channel is contained in a 200-foot-wide trough of black schist, veined with pink granite -- rock nearly as old as life on earth.

Each year, about 25,000 people float this canyon, which only a handful of souls ventured down before World War II. Now it is one of the most coveted outdoor experiences; getting a permit for private trips means negotiating Grand Canyon National Park's bureaucratic maze, as challenging as anything the mighty Colorado can dish up.

But this is why running the Grand is a dream vacation: Endless stretches of wilderness river, punctuated by dozens of huge rapids, cutting a mile-deep slice into the earth's crust. The canyon stretches 280 miles across northern Arizona from Lees Ferry to the slack water of Lake Mead. Towering above the river are depositions of sandstone, shale and limestone, each revealing the geologic story of an era long past.

For many river lovers, the canyon is more than just fun and scenery. It's a living.

Commercial river running in Grand Canyon started in 1938 and has since grown into a $25.5 million industry, owned by 15 outfitters who hold special permits. Together they possess 70 percent of the "user days' on the river, with private boaters getting the remaining 30 percent. The price of a commercial ride averages just over $200 a day.

People seeking a private permit must get in line behind about 6,800 others on the park's notorious waiting list; in 12 to 15 years, maybe they'll get a launch date. The system has proved to be a recipe for disaffection and strife.

"The current management plan caters to the most expensive, fastest, least wilderness-compatible trips," fumed Tom Martin, a Flagstaff, Ariz. whitewater enthusiast who heads the Grand Canyon Private Boaters Association. "The system is on its head. The people who can run the cheapest trips are not allowed."

Martin's 500-member group is lobbying park officials to overhaul the permit system, reallocate some use to private boaters and eliminate motorized transport in the canyon.

Currently motor rigs carry about 75 percent of the commercial traffic and helicopters fly about half the commercial passengers in or out of the canyon at Whitmore Wash.

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