0006 - Redwall Cavern - Grand Canyon Day 3
On the 3rd morning of this excellent adventure, my nomadic river tribe traveled to mile marker 33. The home of Redwall Cavern. We started this morning just like the previous two. We were still getting into the swing of things. Understanding how chores work and becoming accustomed to the ritual that is the 7am “COFFEEEEEEEE” scream from the breakfast crew. After an admittedly slow start to the morning, we left behind our campsite at 29 Mile Canyon and headed to a place called Redwall Cavern.
Admittedly, I knew nothing of our destination. Hans had essentially just told me “It’s epic” and since we were already deep into one of the 7 wonders of the world everything at that point to me was epic. I thought very little of it and just went with the crew. I rode on Steve’s boat that morning. Hans would Kayak with Nani, Tess was on the MiniMax with Chris, Cole’s boat had the usual suspects, Spencer rowed solo, and Sierra and Adam took the sunshine cowgirl. Within about a mile, we were greeted with sunlight a welcome companion en route to our destination. The night before we had an admittedly shady campground and breaking into the light was a (literal) warm welcome. Although we were in the desert, the Grand Canyon in the winter can be a bitterly cold place. Especially in the shade.
Within the first mile of the day, we traversed through our first rapid. A class 3 rapid called fence fault rapid. The boats all passed through it seamlessly and then stopped in a downstream eddie to wait for our kayaking friends to do the same. The duo went through without a problem and then it was smooth sailing as we traveled deeper into the canyon. We would end up stopping for firewood, a vital necessity on river right. Since we were camping in the winter having a campfire every night was essential. And with there being no way of bringing in 20+ nights worth of firewood on the front half of our trip we would need to stop as often as needed every time we saw driftwood for us to collect on a beach. This would become a routine for us. Search, see, and signal for wood and then collect as much as we could reasonably carry on our boats.
Shortly after we collected our bounty of driftwood Mike asked Steve if he could row. Though little did he know that in between us and Redwall cavern was a shallow unmarked swift water rapid section. The current of the river would immediately take the form of a wide S-curve in the river. Mike found himself in an unfriendly section of water to start his rowing, especially considering before this trip he had never been on a riverboat before, ever. However, our resident expert captain in command, Steve, was more than happy to guide him through the shallow swift waters. Commands of “push”, “pull” and other river jargon-filled the air as his coaching led Mike to easily navigate the passage of swift water. As the 3 of us commented on the obstacle we turned our heads to suddenly see that we had arrived. Redwall Cavern was upon us.
On an adventure full of breath taking views, Redwall Cavern is one of the canyon’s crown jewels. It feels like something out of a movie. Something out of this world. To vast and to and epic to describe and even the photos I took don’t quite seem to capture the epic nature of it. Redwall Cavern is this massive cavity in the side of the canyon wall. It’s beautiful and well deserving of its name. We reached this jewel of the canyon sometime in the early morning. Completely alone in the Grand Canyon, we had the cavern to ourselves. We parked our boat on the beach and found ourselves in the company of the cavern. Hans’ description seemed almost inadequate as I walked up inside the cavern from the beach. I believe this was the first moment of our trip that truly took my breath away.
The cavern is massive. From the shallow waters off the beach and from the back wall within it are too wide to capture in a single photo using a 24mm lens. For both of the images below, I had to capture with a series of 5-8 photos and stitch them together in a panorama to be able to compose the image in a single photograph. The scale of the place is unreal and hard to articulate in words alone. Inside the cavern, walking across the sand floor I would snap my fingers and wait for a fraction of a second delay to hear in echo and bounce off of the cavern ceiling.
We would spend the rest of our sunlight that day on the beach and in the cavern. Taking part in various forms of recreation and inebriants we laid out in the sun, away from our dry suits and our worries. We ate sandwiches out of zip-lock baggies and Tupperware that we made during breakfast at the previous camp. I put down my digital camera and brought out the Pentax. We played trout on the beach, did wind sprints from the river into the back of the canyon, and listened to music on someone’s Bluetooth speaker. When we started this trip, I knew virtually no one aside from Hans. I felt like I grew especially closer to my nomad river family lying in the sun that day on the beach.
We stayed there until the sunlight slowly faded away. In the cavern, one final slice of the sun was slowly swallowed up by shade as the fell behind the adjacent canyon wall. I saw Spencer sitting there smoking a joint in the last bit of sun in the cavern. I walked up from my comfortable rock in the shade to join him. We both sat there and shared in a comfortable silence as we watched our island of sunlight slowly shrink into oblivion. As Spencer and I walked out of the cavern we saw the others climbing up the side wall to the south of the cavern to consume what seemed to be the very last bit of sun for the rest of the day. We joined the others and climbed the side wall, perched like birds some ~75 feet above the river bed we laughed at our good fortune as we watched Chris climb even further up the wall.
As the sun left us behind we said goodbye to Redwall Cavern and packed up our gear. I said one final goodbye as I walked through the sand floor of the cavern. Snapping my fingers with every step and hearing the roof of the cavern answer me with the echo of my snap. I said my final silent goodbye to my new friend and got back on Steve’s boat before heading downriver to our next camp, Nautiloid. As we floated down the calm water of the cavern I watched the cavern disappear from view. And suddenly we saw a new friend join us, a bald eagle was spotted some 150-200 feet up on the left-hand canyon wall. We all stood and jokingly saluted our nation’s mascot as we passed.
We landed at our next camp, Nautiloid, and made camp on its beachy shores. This was only the 4th camp of the trip but it was easily my favorite. Probably heavily biased from my appreciation of Redwall Cavern. Regardless it made for a great camp. There was a nearby canyon that we took off to explore as the last remaining twilight light was still in the canyon. Deep in the cavern, we found the remains of smoothed-out rock from a waterfall no longer present. The guidebook said there were fossil sightings in the area, so we searched for them in small groups. However, I unfortunately didn’t find any. Still, the small canyon was an appreciated bonus adventure before we all turned back to camp for dinner and a fire.
After dinner, a large number of us all sat around the fire. We read out loud from various books. And Nani let me use her inReach, it was the first time I was able to contact Angeline since we left the shore of Lee’s Ferry. Sitting by the campfire telling stupid jokes and reading out loud every night quickly became one of my favorite traditions our group started. Cory had brought a book of poems and nodding off to them with a mostly finished beer was my preferred way to end most evenings.
I slept outside for the first night of the trip at Nautiloid; cowboy camping. There was a small sub-beach on the south shore of the campsite. I found a mostly flat spot, laid there, and drifted asleep watching the stars.
