Wandering from Home - Part 1

I was thrilled when my sister-in-law Wendy invited me on a trip to the Grand Canyon. Sure, sure, sure... I will hike it with you... No problem!! But what started out as a girl's weekend away, turned out incredibly different. We embarked upon a bona fide adventure, that challenged us more than expected with quite a few lessons learned. Some of these lessons came the hard way, but I wouldn't trade any of them. The obstacles we overcame, revealed a part of ourselves we had not known before.

Day 1 - Friday, April 9, 2010

With my kiddos off to school, I packed up my gear and headed off. I was supposed to leave home around 11:00 AM, but being the girl I am, I didn't manage to set off until 1:30. But I had no real deadline, so it felt good for once to not have to worry about being anywhere at any set time or screaming and cursing at someone because I was late yet again.

My first destination was Kingman, Arizona, where my brother and sister-in-law live with their three children. Now ironically, my brother was traveling to my house with his kiddos AS I traveled to his home. So all six wild-and-out-of-control cousins and three hyper dogs would be at my house with the two husbands for the weekend, and I would be with my sister-in-law, just the two of us, existing in perfect harmony and peace. Sometimes the planets just align...

Needless to say, I was floating on a cloud as I headed out of Phoenix through Wickenburg, so much so that I began to nod off as I was driving. I knew that I was extremely sleep deprived... I hadn’t managed to get more than fours hours of sleep in a given night over the last three weeks. Now I could have pulled over and rested, but I would have had to sleep for at least eight hours on the side of the road in order to not be in a state of dozing off... so I pushed on.

I sent out a few texts hoping for some company on the road. I heard back from my sister Jen, who reminded me to be careful texting while driving... Which I know to be dangerous, and irresponsible, and bad, and wrong, but I do it anyway sometimes... sorry, but at least I am honest... and I don’t do it with my kids in the car... scout’s honor. That way I could turn up my music really loud, put the AC on high, set the cruise control and still carry on a conversation. I believed all of these components were necessary to stay awake.


So what is the first thing my sister texts??? “Stop and get a big fat iced coffee.” Well yes Love I would, if I weren’t in the middle of NOWHERE!! I was 58 miles from the next services. But two text messages later, the world as I knew it came to an end... I LOST PHONE SERVICE... and now I was utterly alone.

So the music gets turned up louder, AC set even colder, petal to the metal and onward I went. Face slapping and yelling helped somewhat, but thank God for Alice in Chains and the Violent Femmes.

As I drove through the desert, I watched the Joshua trees faded in to the Saguaro cactus as the elevation increased. When I reached Wikieup, I hesitated too long and before I realized it, I had passed through the entire reservation town. Thankfully Luchia’s Restaurant appeared like a mirage just outside of town, where they poured me a much needed cup of coffee, getting me back on track with only 46 miles to Kingman.

Once I arrived, my sister-in-law and I ran around buying the last odds and ends for our trip, and began to load up our packs. First, we laid everything out including food, water, clothes, first aid, extra shoes, coats, tent, sleeping bags, sleeping mats, miniature camp stove, cooking pot, camp mugs, dehydrated meals, cameras, books, sunscreen, bug spray, TP, hats... the pile was massive. We began stuffing and tying and strapping and cramming... Try as we might, well, it just wouldn’t all fit... so we honed it down as much as possible.

And when we had stuffed our packs from top to bottom we realized we had in no way shape or form anticipated how heavy our packs would be. We pulled out Wendy’s bathroom scale to weigh them... first ourselves, then with the packs on. Her pack weighed 35 pounds and mine 40!

Just the very act of picking up the packs and getting them on our backs was colossal. So we lessened our loads even more... parting with anything that wasn’t absolutely necessary like a towel, cribbage board, deck of cards, a few bottles of water and some food. I mean who needs food and water anyway? With about five pounds removed from each, the godforsaken backpacks still felt heavy beyond belief.

In attempting to pull them on and strap into them, we found it difficult to maintain balance, decorum or restraint as we broke into uncontrollable laughter. The kind of belly laughter that brings you to the floor, takes your breath away, leaves your sides aching, cheeks burning and eyes watering.

We vowed that our next trip together would be to a spa. We even toyed with the idea of heading to Laughlin, or better yet Vegas, in the morning, taking a few pictures of ourselves in our packs in front of a cactus, hoping no one would be the wiser.

When finally we recovered, doubt had unwittingly began to seep in. Doubt in our ability to do what we had set out to do--hike 12 miles down into the Grand Canyon to Havasu Falls, camp overnight and hike out the next day. Until now there had never been a reservation or misgiving shared between us. But reality was heavy... 65 pounds of overwhelming uncertainty. And we both found it difficult to fall asleep that night, worrying and wondering if we would be able realize our dream.

To be continued...

Wandering from Home - Part 2