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Show j ' N i " . Cedarites Make Colorful Colorado River Run in Homemade Kayaks by Colleen Cox and Daphn Cooper Saturday, June 3, eighteen expectant ex-pectant people assembled at 4 a. m. at the Laurence Cooper residence. res-idence. Yet, in all this group of rugged masculinity, we and Mrs. Ellen Atkin were the only three who had the good fortune to be female. Included in those making mak-ing the trip, then, were Laurence Lau-rence C. Cooper, his daughter, Daphne, and sons, Hal and David; Dav-id; Colleen Cox, Doug and Karl Braithwaite, Floyd Atkln, his wife, Ellen, and sons Curtis, Dale and Scott; Steve White, Michael Broadbent, David IMchstag and Robert Cooper of Salt Lake City and his sons, Bob and Rex. The eagerness of the group can only be appreciated and understood under-stood fully by knowing that this moment was the climax of months of work and planning. For the boats had been built of fibreglass during many long, exacting ex-acting and itching hours during the winter. Mr. Cooper and Prof. Steve Moss hao designed the boat, made tho mold and pro duced the finished kayaks with the help of most of the boys in the party and some few others, who, at the last moment, were unable to make the trip. Excitement was high, then, as the cars drove up, boats firmly fastened to the top of each. After retrieving the duffle from underneath under-neath the Cooper car (Mrs. Cooper Coop-er had backed over it in the dark) and stashing Colleen's tropical sun helmet, which had been mashed in the process, we started on our way. Our route led us through Capitol Capi-tol Reef and Fruita. Here we got our first taste of the beautiful, rugged scenery which was to be with us throughout the trip. Here also Mr. Cooper haDDily made ar rangements for the acquisition of some valuable geology books for the library at the College of Southern Utah. The Atkins car was one of the first to arrive at the river; and, after the first boat was loaded, Curtis and David !i. decided to take a private excursion across the river and back while waiting for the slow-pokes. They got across alright, but were a bit embarrassed not to be able to get back because of the current. They had to wait downstream on a sand bar until the rest of us caught up. Down the river we were to proceed pro-ceed as follows: First launching, six miles above Hite undetermined undeter-mined camp spot that night; Lake Canyon camp the following evening; Hole in the Rock next, and the final night's camp at Aztec Canyon, near Rainbow Bridge. Green and Inexperienced though we were, with a fast river, riv-er, we went 20 miles Saturday afternoon. The next day in slower slow-er water we traveled 35 (ouch) miles; and, taking several side trips, went 29 miles, 15 miles and 28 miles the following successive day. T'.ie last 28 miles were on slow, siow water the final morning. morn-ing. It took, four and one half hours and many, many oar strokes to land us at Crossing of the Fathers at 10:30 a. m. where we waited a long, hot hour for the cars that were to bring us out Probably the most lasting Impression Im-pression of the trip was that of the paddling. We would sit in the boat in ours. Daphne in front. Colleen in the middle, and Mr. Cooper on the deck behind and try to stroke in unison. Our boat was rather difficult to row because the three of us made it heavy. Most of the boats carried two passengers. However, Atkin's two-man rubber raft took the prize for being the hardest to handle. It made our work seem much easier just to see Mr. Atkin At-kin struggling with that recalcitrant recalci-trant animal. He maintained that It was much cooler than the kayaks, though, and cheerfully cheer-fully paddled out the trip in it. In our boat, we had a sjngle oar each for tho Rirls and a double dou-ble oar for Mr. Cooper. We would Intently watch the bow of the boat to make sure that It didn't' turn our way as this always Involved In-volved an interval of breathless peddling on our part to right it. One or the other of us girls was usually working manfully at our oar: "Dig to the right!", and its counterpart became routine commands. com-mands. We had been prepared when we set out on our trip to expect many dangers, the best of which was THE RAPIDS! We could envision en-vision ourselves bobbing down the stream in our bright orange life Jackets, the boat keel up-floating up-floating behind, and the duffle sinking to the bottom. Much to our disappointment, the rapids gave us only an occasional lap-ful lap-ful of water and no spills. Unloading the boats and setting set-ting up camp after a day's rowing row-ing also proved to be an experience, exper-ience, especially when one was tired and stiff as we were. Then came the joys of cooking Postum water and rice .ner a fire or over canned heat and doing the dishes. Doing the dishes was the girls' Job; here we actually ex celled the boys. Sometimes we washed them (the dishes that is) in the river (no one got dysentery), dysen-tery), and sometimes we used the clear streams coming down out of the canyons. All of us came through the trip with few scars even from the hikes to Rainbow Bridge and Hole in the Rock where some of the party had a brush with poison poi-son ivy. Yet, we must admit to one victim Daphne. It must have been her unlucky day. She ripped out the seat and both knees of her pants, dislocated her shoulder, had two sieges of sunsickness, fell and suffered bruises and abrasions, and got bit by a red ant. But none of us would have stayed home for the world. The river and the rocks and the people we met were wonderful. We wish everyone, especially es-pecially those who live in this 'area, could enjoy the same experiences ex-periences we did. They would never forget it! |