Chapter 3

April 18, 1999

Flagstaff and Lee's Ferry, Arizona

There were some supplies that Scooter needed to fill out early the next morning, things like extra sunscreen, sunglasses, Chapstick, and tampons, but fortunately they were able to find them in a convenience store not far from the motel. The Canyon Tours business office proved to be a small building that had once been a house, with a large steel building in the back and a big parking lot. Crystal parked the Dodge along the back fence and got out.

Scooter got out of the car and checked out the scene. There was a short-bodied school bus, painted brown with a big "Canyon Tours" logo, and a big pickup truck with a flatbed trailer parked in front of the steel building. The trailer was stacked with five light blue rafts. They were bigger than the ones she was used to from back east, but they never carried any gear back there except maybe for a cooler full of drinks on hot days as the eastern runs were seldom long enough to bother with a lunch on the river. Scooter knew that even gear and food to backpack for three weeks without replenishment added up to a hell of a lot, and they probably didn't exactly do stuff like backpackers here. "Don't look like we're getting very close to started yet," Crystal commented. "Might as well see if Al and Louise are here."

They walked across the gravel parking lot and into the shade of the metal shed. "Morning, Crystal," they heard a woman's voice from one side, "I heard you were in the Burro last night. How's the head?"

"No head," Crystal grinned. "We had stuff to do, so we just held it to a couple. Louise, this is Scooter, the gal I was telling you about."

"Good to meet you," the woman said. As Scooter's eyes adjusted to the darkness, she could see that she was as big as Crystal, middle-aged, but in very good shape, with short brown hair. "Al," she called in a louder voice, "Crystal and the new swamper are here."

"Be right there," they heard a man's voice call from somewhere in the back of the building. In a moment, he appeared. He was a big man, somewhere over six feet, broad through the shoulders, skin on the darkish side, walking with a noticeable limp. "So you're Scooter," he said as he got closer. "Crystal has been telling us a lot about you. I don't know what she's told you about us, but I know Crystal isn't much of a bullshit artist."

"Well, I hope I can live up to what she's been telling you," Scooter grinned.

"You ran rafts with her back east, right?"

"Not actually with her, we worked for different outfits," Scooter explained, "But we ran on the Nanty and the Ocoee a fair amount and we hung out together off river quite a bit for a couple years there."

"All paddle raft, right?"

"Yeah, I've never actually been on a raft with oars. Been mostly on the Nanty, the Ocoee some, and one summer on the New. Eight years total."

"I've done it both ways, and prefer oars," Al said. "We get customers once in a while that want to paddle, so sometimes we run a trip with a paddle raft or two. I've tried to hold it down the last year or two since there's only been Louise and me that know how to run a paddle raft. Now, with Crystal here, and you, we might have to rethink that a little. She said that you were OLTA, like her, and had done the AT."

"OLTA in '91, and I can't believe it was that long ago. The AT in '93. I tried it two other times, but had bad knee problems and had to bomb out."

"Believe me, I know how that works," Al grinned. "I've got a bad one from Vietnam myself. Did Crystal tell you any about how we do things here?"

"She talked about it a little," Scooter nodded. "She said there was stuff you'd want to go over with me, so there was no point in hearing it twice. We had some catching up to do last night, anyway. I hadn't seen her for two years."

"I asked her to keep it down a little," Al nodded. "Mostly because there's stuff that I want to be sure you've been told. Here's the deal. I'm not going to commit to anything past this one trip right now. You're going to have to go as a swamper, a helper, and get stuck with some of the shit details, OK? Crystal will tell you everyone starts like that, just like she did. Hell, just like I did. I'll see that you get some time on the sticks, and see what you've got. If you pick it up, you'll probably get a lot of time on the sticks. There's a lot more to being a boatman than just rowing the raft. The days are long as hell, before dawn to after dark. We pretty well go all summer without much in the way of breaks, and we take our break over the winter. You get through the first trip OK, we'll talk about the rest of the summer. The insurance company likes to see four trips for people coming in from outside, but I can fuzz one or two if things get tight, so if you work out all right, and Louise and I think you can handle a raft, you'll get a raft sooner or later. That sort of depends on availability and seniority, but most likely before the season's over with. Sound like a reasonable deal?"

"Sounds a lot better than just having to do it cold, which is kind of the impression I got over the phone. It's got to be pretty different than the Nanty and the Ocoee."

"The rafts are still rubber," he grinned, "And the water is still wet. Crystal would tell you that the details are pretty different. Welcome to Canyon Tours, Scooter. I'll have to get you to sign some paperwork before we get out of here, so we might as well get that done now before we get busy with everything else we have to deal with on loading morning."

"Is your name actually Scooter?" Louise asked.

"No," Scooter grinned, "It's Rhonda, but I'm trying to forget it. Please, just call me Scooter."

"I'm afraid your paychecks are going to have to say Rhonda," Louise smiled. "But we'll try to keep it a secret. Did Crystal tell you what the deal is on pay?"

"No, all she said was that she was surprised as hell to get a paycheck after her first trip, she'd have paid to go if she'd had the money."

"It was a freebie when it started, but she proved she was worth it on that first trip," Louise nodded. "If you work out anywhere near as well, it'll be worth the money again. The deal is that you're taking a trip as a swamper, that's a flat thousand per trip. It's two once you have a raft, more if you're trip leader or assistant. It sounds like good money but if you work it out on a per-hour basis, it reeks, which is why we do it by the trip. On the other hand, you don't have any expenses on the river, you've got a place to stay, and the company covers meals. I know we've had kids go through here who don't spend two hundred bucks out of their pockets all season."

"And then they piss it away having a good time over the winter," Al grinned, "Like as not they're so broke they have to hitchhike back in the spring. I know I did a couple times way back when."

"Yeah, while I was working," Louise snorted. "Don't think I wasn't goddamn jealous of you, either. Come on, Scooter, let's go fill out the forms while they get started on loading."

The office proved to be small, what had been a none-too-large living room of a small house; the rest of the building was obviously gear storage of one sort or another, except for a small private office. "Usually, it's just Al and I who run the office," Louise explained. "We're short on trip leaders right now, so we're going to change off leading trips this year, and it won't be the first time. Al is leading this trip, and I'm staying back. Did Crystal explain to you how green this crew is going to be?"

"A little," Scooter nodded.

"It's really not the way we wanted to do it," she said, digging in a file cabinet for some paperwork. "But this is Dave and Mary's first year as trip leader and co-leader, so we didn't want to load them up on newbies too much. It gives Al and me a chance to keep a closer eye on the rest of you. Look, I'm going to be honest, we prefer to bring people up through the company, but sometimes we don't have enough people and just can't do that, and this is one of those times. Crystal worked out well for us last fall, and she seems to think highly of you, so we're taking a chance on you, considering you have the same sort of experience she has. I hope it works out well for you and you work out well for us."

"I'll do my damndest," Scooter nodded. "If I can't hack it, don't try to carry me, tell me up front, OK?"

"That's an attitude I like to hear," Louise grinned. "We get guys in here who are all full of shit and testosterone, think they know everything, and don't know shit. Women know they have to prove themselves, and frankly, we have to be better than the men to be considered equal. But that's the way it always was. They went a long time on this river before there were women boatmen or trip leaders, except for Georgie White, who ran her own outfit. Today, maybe a quarter of the boatmen are women. We've come a long way since I started back in the sixties."

"Wow, you've been at this a while."

"Over thirty years," Louise told her. "I ran my first trip as a swamper back in '67, and I had a hell of a time getting on the crew; it wouldn't have happened if my dad hadn't had Willie Stein over a barrel. I started my first trip as a boatman the day Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. I was the first woman boatman for Canyon Tours, and like the third on the river, counting Georgie. I was the second woman trip leader, again after Georgie, in '73. Long story about that, we don't have time for it now, Al will probably tell you, and if he doesn't, I'll tell you next trip."

Jesus, Scooter thought without saying anything. If I stayed on this river for that long I'd be pushing 60 before I have the kind of experience she has. "I'll be looking forward to hearing it," she grinned as Louise set several papers in front of her -- a W-4, several releases, things like that.

In a few minutes they were back outside. In that time, several other people had shown up, and there was a bustle of activity around the back of the bus and the trailer loaded with rafts. Crystal told Scooter she'd already loaded her gear on the bus, and they joined the rest of the group hauling stuff to the bus or the pickup. Several items were large, white coolers -- heavy ones -- but there were many drybags, too. It took a while, and there was some confusion, but after a while they seemed to be loaded.

Al called everyone around the back of the bus, and said, "Well, I hope we got everything. I spent a lot of time last week going over the checklists, so we should be OK, so long as we haven't forgotten to bring the oars or something stupid like that. I know everyone just sort of started pitching in so there hasn't been much chance for introductions. I usually like crews to know each other better than we've got to this trip, but we're just going to have to make do. You all know me and Louise; I'll be leading this time, Louise the next time. Jeff is driving the bus as usual, and Jimmie will drive the pickup this trip. Louise will ride back with one of them. I figure with everybody being green and not having worked together, we can use the extra hands. Jeff is going to come back tonight most likely, and Jimmie in the morning. Now, we're taking five rafts this trip. Dan and Jerry, I know you don't know Crystal, she came to us last summer, but she's had a lot of experience back east and done a few special things. She ran as a boatman the last trip last year. She's gonna be assistant trip leader on account of her age and other experience, although it's as much a learning thing for her as it is for you. Crystal, this is gonna be Dan and Jerry's first full season, but they ran as swampers two summers now, and Louise and I think they're ready for rafts of their own and are gonna be all right. The two of you have run together before, haven't you?"

"The year before last," Dan nodded.

"I was thinking that," Al smiled. "OK, after two summers, you ought to pretty well know the drill of how we do stuff the Canyon Tours way, so you're going to have to help Charlie, our other boatman. He's just a fill-in for this trip; he usually runs a motor rig for Grand Canyon Rafters runs an oar trip once in a while so he knows how it's done on the water, but he's used to doing things a little different on land. GCR doesn't start their first regular trip until a few days after we get off this one, and he'll be gone then, but the next trip we'll have a college kid with about the experience of Dan and Jerry replacing him. It could be one of three guys, and I ain't sure yet who. Finally, our last person on this trip is Scooter here, our swamper for this run. I just met her in the last hour or so, and she's a total newbie to the Canyon, but she's run rafts in the east even longer than Crystal, so I'm hoping she picks up the Canyon Tours way of doing things right quick. Now, we might as well get moving since we have a lot to do up at Lee's, especially with this being the first trip of the season. Before we get going though, I just want to say that I want everyone to have a safe season, and if you do, it'll be a good one. All of you are pretty new, especially to being boatmen, so if you have any question, do the safe thing. I'll talk a lot more about it tonight and tomorrow morning before the customers show up."

Another trip on a bus, and this was more of a school bus, not a big comfortable diesel pusher. But this was special; they were heading for the river, and not just any river. Scooter realized that in the process she could be heading for a new life as well, much different than anything she could have dreamed of a week ago.

It was a fairly long ride out to the put-in at Lee's Ferry, close to three hours on roads that weren't very good pavement. They quickly got out of the pine country around Flagstaff, and were soon in a brushwood desert, running much of the way through a valley with steep red walls and talus slopes lying at their bases. Here and there were tiny villages -- they were going through the Navajo reservation before long -- and in several places along the road were collections of rude souvenir stands, mostly empty. It seemed a long, long way from North Carolina. Eventually, they turned off the main road and descended to Navajo Bridge -- actually, a pair of bridges, one now used only as a footbridge. As they passed over the vehicular bridge, they could see the green waters of the Colorado below, far down at the bottom of a canyon with nearly vertical sides. Shortly afterward, they turned off onto a side road and descended steeply, coming out at Lee's Ferry, the last place to put rafts in before reaching the Grand Canyon. The place was named for a Mormon who had once run a rowboat ferry service across the river -- there was a lot more story than that, Crystal told her, maybe she'd have the time to tell it later.