We made our way out of the Gems on the tenth day and into Boucher canyon. My pack was cutting into my shoulders and it was a cold blustery windy day that whipped up lose sand and shale. Along the way we stopped by Slate canyon which appeared to be dry but we found a stream above the contact to replenish our water supply. The canyon opened up past Slate as the Tonto shelf widened into a plateau. I sang to the canyon as I traversed the Tonto, the wind carrying away my song. Upon reaching the top of Boucher canyon, I stopped to rest. My legs were hurting more and more. I took in the view and marveled that 15 years ago I was in the bed of the canyon below looking up to where I was, wondering about the Gems route. I felt a sense of closure and gratitude for 15 years of dreaming that came to pass.
The descent into the bed of Boucher canyon was painful, steep and rock-strewn. Jeremy had gone on ahead while I carefully picked my way down. It would be awful if I broke something because I became careless and complacent for having come so far. Jeremy was nowhere to be found when I reached the bed of Boucher canyon. I called out a few times and scouted around, I weighed the options and surmised he had probably made his way up canyon.
Although the journey down the bed of Boucher canyon to the Colorado is fairly straightforward as the walls widen and the bed levels out, going up canyon involved a fair amount of bushwhacking as the walls narrow and constrain the perennial Boucher creek strewn with boulders left behind from past flash floods. I got a bit lost a few times, and wondered if I was even going the right way when faced with a wall of overgrown vegetation. Still I persisted and eventually encountered Jeremy who was resting and waiting for me on a red sandstone sill.
We chatted about Louis Boucher, the hermit who lived and mined in the area for 20 years, whom Boucher canyon and the neighboring Hermit canyon was named after. Upon swapping trip stories, we discovered another coincidence between the two of us; Jeremy had guided a group out the day before my group was due to head out on the Thunder River trip. Both groups were caught by surprise by the unexpected storm that caused snowfall in May. I shared with Jeremy my fantasy of becoming the hermit of Tapeats creek on that trip.
“What will you survive on” he asked,
“I figured I’ll flag down passing river runners and give massages in exchange for beer and burritos”
“That sounds alright,” he laughed.
It was not much. A silly fantasy, but it was the first time I had shared something personal unabashedly. I had always kept to myself, afraid others would find out about my past, my condition, my true self. Even Marc, my best friend back in Singapore whom I was the most open with, had no idea until he read the earlier chapters. I think it was Linda and Dawn who set the stage; I strangely felt a level of safety towards members of that trip. I was hiking between them on the packrafting trip that Jeremy led and they kept engaging me despite my efforts to maintain my distance. I eventually opened up somewhat towards the end of that trip and let slip that I rescued special needs rabbits. To a schizoid, that was tantamount to open heart surgery.
I woke on the eleventh day feeling inexplicably sad. Jeremy was up before I was which was unusual as Jeremy was a leisurely riser. Most days I would already be up at dawn, watch the sunrise and wait for him to get up before we made breakfast and broke camp. He had made breakfast, and I ate breakfast for the first time after two days without in an attempt to ration food.
When I reached the bed of Boucher canyon the day before, I was struck by a view up the canyon I thought I recognized and took a photograph; It later turned out I had taken the exact picture 15 years ago. From that point onwards, I was retracing my first trip into the Grand Canyon. Our last two days paralleled the end of the Hermit-Boucher loop I did 15 years ago. Almost fell to my death on both trips, both trips pushed my limits and helped me discover my inner awesomeness. I had come full circle. I am always sad leaving the canyon, but the finality and the dream I harbored for 15 years weighed in on me, making the last days of the trip even more bittersweet.
The stretch of Tonto between Boucher canyon and Hermit canyon was a lot more difficult than I remembered, though granted my memory was 15 years ago. I recalled the sensation of flying then but there was no flying this time round, it seemed longer and needed more work crossing the levels. Perhaps I was worn out by now, or perhaps instead of starting in the early morning when it was cool, we were now exposed to the hot afternoon sun for the entire stretch. Nevertheless I did not recognize any of it until I reached the point where the Tonto trail turns into and descends into Hermit canyon. At this point the North Rim recedes and it appears as if the canyon just expands out, my eyes however were drawn to some fallen boulders close to the Tonto trail on the other side of Hermit canyon across from where I was. For years, I had recurring dreams of those same boulders to the extent that when I woke, I would struggle to recall whether it was real or just my imagination. There they were in front of me, they were real. I had been dreaming of a return.
When we arrived at the bed of Hermit canyon, I thought I could recognize the spot where Eb and I had camped but I could not be sure. Jeremy explained that a few years ago a massive flash flood had swept through Hermit canyon and totally rearranged it, and pointed to a tree trunk from the flood lodged 25 feet up the canyon wall. As we made our way up Hermit canyon to our camp for the night, it felt strange as I did not recognize any of it, yet it felt strangely familiar.
“I’m sorry. I don’t feel well, I’m going to turn in early.” I had been battling a low-grade fever for the past few days but it became severe upon reaching Hermit canyon. My whole body ached, I felt nauseous. I knew I needed to get better as much as I can as we were hiking out the next day from river level to rim level, the highest elevation change of the trip.
“What about dinner? I was planning to start in an hour.” Jeremy asked.
“No it’s ok. I don’t think I can eat. I still have a ration of bars if I get hungry later.” I popped the maximum daily dosage of Ibuprofen and acetaminophen and slept through the night for the first time in the entire trip. Before the medication took effect, I thought I could die happy with my dream fulfilled. Then I wondered what other dreams were still unfulfilled; I wanted to leave having lived as fully and beautifully as I could (and not some manic delusion). I wondered what things I had to do before I returned again.
I felt better when I woke the next day, the fever had subsided though I had a headache. Jeremy had breakfast while I skipped mine, I did not feel well enough to keep anything down. From Hermit creek at the bottom of Hermit canyon, it is a relentless uphill climb particularly the stretch of endless rocky switchbacks dubbed the Cathedral stairs before it levels out near the top of the Redwall cliffs. I decided my best bet with my limited reserves was to take advantage of the cool morning and make it up as far as I could before my legs gave up, or the sun rose high and the heat tired me out. Once it did, I would inevitably fall far behind.
Thus I gunned my way up up and up, sweating buckets from the strain, stopping here and now to catch my breath or to stop a nosebleed. But I made it to the top of the Cathedral stairs before the sun got overhead. I dropped my pack and rested, marshaling my strength for the remaining stretch.
“You were a machine!” Jeremy exclaimed when he caught up with me where I was resting in the shade. “Each time I thought I was going to catch up, you kept going and going and going!”
“Well, I had to do it before I ran out of gas. And I’m all out.”
We kept pace and chatted for a while.
“What are you going to get when you get on top?” Jeremy asked. “Me, I’m craving a big juicy burger.”
“Singapore Chili crab.” I replied without hesitation “It is crab that is cooked until the meat is rendered out in the sweet spicy chili sauce, and you scoop it up with a piece of baguette.”
“Oh my god! I don’t know what it is but I want one now! That sounds amazing!”
“It is. But I’ll settle for some frou-frou iced coffee drink with whipped cream and shit on top. Because nothing reminds one is back in civilization than a Iced Crappucino.” I replied. Jeremy laughed.
I began slowing down as my reserves dwindled through the long traverse, and the big steps between levels jarred my legs.
“How are you doing?” Jeremy asked
“My head hurts, my eyes hurt, my stomach hurts, my legs hurt.“ I replied matter-of-factly
“I arranged for a friend to pick us up at 2pm, he is going to leave if he doesn’t see us by 3pm. I’m going to go ahead to meet him, you can take your time.”
However, I found Jeremy waiting for me impatiently at Santa Maria spring. He had ran out of water and forgot the filter was in my pack. I apologized for being slow.
“You could drink this water straight, but I don’t want to take any chances.” Jeremy said as he filtered water into his water bottles “I don’t want to be shitting through a screen door.”
Santa Maria spring is a popular day hike turnaround spot on the Hermit trail. There was a couple resting in the shelter when I met up with Jeremy. They emerged in matching coordinated hiking outfits and passed ahead of us to make their way back to the rim while we were repacking our backpacks at the spring.
“Well …. “ we overheard her as she gasped. “That’s the first time I heard someone put it THAT way”.
Jeremy went on ahead to meet his friend and the pickup time. My pace slowed considerably after the spring, the final push was steep, climbing 2000 feet over 4km. On top of my leg pains, my hunger was getting to me as well, I had not had breakfast nor lunch, nor dinner last night. I still had some ration bars but I was nauseous, I would probably throw up if I ate one of those mealy tasting bars. So I worked out system to break it down into manageable chunks, I would push myself to climb 10 steps then stop to rest and push myself another 10 steps and repeat. And so I made my way out, bowed over in pain, 10 steps at a time.
In Singapore one cannot move every far, one is contained in this “paradise” of 31 miles by 17 miles where everything is the same and everyone is the same. The feeling of loss and distance of traveling or moving away expressed in novels had always eluded me because there was no place one could escape the conformity and confinement, to start afresh. Having walked over 90 miles on this trip, I had broken past those physical and psychological boundaries that tied me to the island. The Grand Canyon had always felt home to me, and that gave me the strength to continue to live and cope with my bipolar condition 15 years ago; now it made me come to terms with and close out Singapore and my past traumas. In the past I was severely hung up about it, but I was no longer ashamed of what I felt what I experienced what I had done that society perceived to be weakness. I am stronger than those who had beaten me down, and I should not beat myself up for getting beaten.
As I closed the circle, closed the loop on past missteps and regrets, I realized the coincidences between myself and Jeremy were not just synchronicity; Jeremy represented a parallel life I wished I had led, and might have led if I was born differently. Through Jeremy, I saw how it could be yet I did felt neither regret nor envy. I am happy someone is living that life but now I need to find my own, a life that only I could live. I will let go of the what ifs and what nots and find my unique singular path to discover. Like the Gems, I will get lost and stuck on myriad side routes but I have to trust in myself, and trust that I will eventually find my way back on route. Each tread I take, each cairn I build (like this piece of writing), helps define the path ahead and sets the signposts for someone like me in the future to follow.
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