Dodging Lightning on Vishnu Temple

DANCING WITH LIGHTNING ON MIGHTY VISHNU TEMPLE

When hen six of us step off Cape Final on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon for a weeklong backpack, we're instantly transformed into wide-eyed children exploring a ravishing terrain.

Our goal rests on the summit of Vishnu Temple, the high peak rising alone and razor-sharp at the Grand Canyon's eastern end, summit elevation 7,533 feet. But all of us know, without ever saying it out loud, that although the climb represents an objective easily explained to outsiders, the real prize lies in the anticipation of the unknown.

In spite of the landscape's obvious grandeur, some nonbackpackers ask, "Why would you grunt around with that mass of gear, sleep on the ground and stay out in the rain?"

Backpacking is an excuse to be outdoors, of course, but there are deeper answers. George Steck, dean of Grand Canyon backpackers and author of Hiking Grand Canyon Loops: Adventures in the Backcountry, says that for him, "It is the challenge, the chance to grapple with the physical and mental obstacles of the natural world." Good answer. Outdoorsman Daryl Willmarth, a long-time friend, occasional river boatman and backpacker, says it's simple: He sees back-packing as a chance to "scratch, cuss, spit, stink and grunt unimpeded as real men, and liberated women, are wont to do." Who could argue?

Yet the best answer may come from Maureen DeVeny, a Tucson hiker and river-runner. She's not a hotshot backpacker, and when she does pack, she complains a lot. But, covertly, she loves it. DeVeny says back-packing allows her to be childlike again, just following her nose, listening to a little voice whispering, "Let's see where this goes." Simple as that.

Then again, Steck, Willmarth and DeVeny stayed at home for this expedition.

Four days are required to approach the base of the peak of Vishnu Temple. The first two days are killers, requiring rappels,bushwhacks along the Colorado River, nasty climbs and hairy descents. The third and fourth days are the opposite: embarrass-ingly easy, although not for Jacek Macias, Bob Kerry and Mike Coltrin, who scale irre-sistible buttes and cliffs along the way while the rest of us simply plod toward the next camp, hoarding our energy for Vishnu Temple and moleskin for our feet.

Kerry, a retired attorney, has written several climbing articles for Arizona Highways; Coltrin is a retired railroad worker. Both live in Tucson. Macias works as a quality control manager in a Chicago machine shop. As they walk along, all three shamelessly ogle every summit.

Finally, at the end of the sunny and hot fourth day, I wander alone along the floor of Vishnu Canyon. I come to a series of pools cradled in sandstone half a billion years old where, just beyond, Dave Baker and his sister, Brenda Baker, are setting up camp. Dave owns an outdoor equipment store in Tucson, and Brenda is a biochemist from San Diego. The three of us round out the climbing group. The Vishnu Canyon spring becomes our base of operations, a snug, watered haven from which we will aim for the summit. It is quiet in camp this evening before tomorrow's summit attempt. The sky is clear, the air still. After dinner and conversation, we slip into our sleeping bags. Once more I'm struck by the privilege of sleeping on the floor of Grand Canyon, on the gravel and bedrock of the ancient Earth, looking back in time to the stars. No need of a roof. Not even the fabric of a tent. Breathing in and out with the wind is all that's required on this serene night.

It is quiet in camp this evening before tomorrow's summit attempt. The sky is clear, the air still. After dinner and conversation, we slip into our sleeping bags. Once more I'm struck by the privilege of sleeping on the floor of Grand Canyon, on the gravel and bedrock of the ancient Earth, looking back in time to the stars. No need of a roof. Not even the fabric of a tent. Breathing in and out with the wind is all that's required on this serene night.

When I was a boy in Rocky River, Ohio, I was for a while a church acolyte. Between duties at the beginning and end of the ser-vice, my sidekick and I explored the great building and its many annexes. We prowled through basements filled with abandoned pews, dusty storerooms and stairs leading to locked doors. There was even a labyrinthine route up into a tight, sweltering chamber where we could almost touch the great stained glass window. Every Sunday we probed a bit farther into unknown territory. And never once got caught. Now, as I try to sleep at the foot of Vishnu Temple, it would appear that not even 40 years of mis-adventures have been sufficient to quell the urge to explore.Dawn comes. After a quick breakfast, we leave our backpack gear by the pools but safeguard it from wind, rain and rodents. All of us but Kerry leave just after 7 A.M., mov-ing fast with daypacks, each loaded with a gallon of water, food, maps, jackets and flash-lights. (Kerry has chosen to climb 2,000 feet solo to the top of Krishna Shrine, another nearby peak. He is nursing a sore ankle, and he has scaled Vishnu before.) We head up the canyon, climb up a steep talus slope, contour into a limestone ravine, scramble up the crevice to a saddle, take a break there, then begin a long journey up through the Supai Sandstone ledges.

Still climbing in the shade of the west-facing slope, we move up into the Hermit Shale and Coconino Sandstone. Tilting slabs of ancient desert sands blanket layers of old red mud.

Up higher, there's a maze of sandstone fins and chutes - closely spaced steep routes between towers of rock. This tangle of false leads thwarts many would-be climbers. For them, a shot at the summit slips out of reach as dead ends eat up the daylight. But both Coltrin and Macias have been here before, so the confusion of routes does us no harm.

On we climb to a narrow flat bench. Again we rest, this time in the sun, and the effect is not pleasant. As best we can, we hide next to rock outcrops and beneath our hats. Clouds loiter nearby but fail to intervene. No matter. The summit, now only 400 feet above us, comes into view. It softly sings our names.

The eastward view is staggering as we cross the flat platform of rock. There's Unkar Rapid, Tanner Canyon, Comanche Point. Then we begin another scramble, this one up a shaded ravine of cracks and chock-stones. Ahead of us, Macias and Coltrin soon move out of sight. The Bakers and I stick together.

The ravine takes us close to the summit this is good. But, once out of its confines, we're surprised at the altered demeanor of the sky. Black clouds gather and this is bad. Just then, someone whoops from the top, Coltrin or Macias.

Two final obstacles block our way. Brenda, Dave, then I scale the first, a knobby cliff about 10 feet high. This places us on a narrow platform 3,300 feet above our camp, 5,000 feet above the Colorado, 20 feet below the summit.

The final pitch, already gained by the leaders, proves less tricky, but it's highly exposed. In other words, a misstep would be curtains. Coltrin lowers a rope and Brenda goes to the summit on belay.

I'm next. As I'm getting tied in, there's a flash and BANG. Lightning. A torrent of cussing comes cascading down from above. The three climbers on top dive into cracks and fissures. Down below, Dave and I cozy up to the cliff. It begins to rain.

We're surrounded by air and a lot of broken, pointy rocks. Every one of the pointy rocks, dozens of them, buzz with electricity. Together they sound like sizzling bacon, a sound and an image I find troubling. The rope in my hands hisses, and I drop it to the ground. Metal objects, wristwatches especially, crackle with electrical energy. I realize that neither Dave nor I may ever reach the summit of Vishnu Temple and that the three up there on top probably wish they weren't. Nothing is as I expected it would be. Dave and I listen while Macias continues to provoke the fates with back talk, his Polish accent adding an extra zest. Finally, he slides down the rope to join us at the foot of the cliff.

Close call. Dave says he felt an invisible shirt ripped from his bare arms. We all felt a "force field" pass by. We are now, like it or not, in that supernatural realm where the Titans play their games. Here on Vishnu Temple, today, our Earth is a magnificent and terrible game board.

In 15 minutes, the dark clouds have wandered away and the sizzling has stopped. Macias returns to the top, Coltrin and Brenda Squirm out of their hidey-holes. I go up. Brenda climbs down. Dave comes up.

The summit is flat but highly fractured, only 6 or 8 feet wide and maybe 25 feet long. A climber's register glints from a rock cairn. As I sign in as a member of the 22nd ascent group, I ask myself, is this my last mark?

The still-spitting rain leaves welts on the register sheet as I write. Above us, a new set of ominous clouds drifts into position. In haste we take a few pictures and then scramble down.

The descent is like a tumble down a stupendous set of wrecked stair steps. Once again we feel like toddlers hardly able to cope with a world made for giants. Then there's another bolt. BANG. Missed again.

In a few hours, we're back in camp, trading tales with Kerry who has successfully climbed Krishna Shrine. We're all exhilarated although emotionally spent.

Yesterday morning we envisioned a leisurely lunch hour on the summit, surveying the rugged topography of eastern Grand Canyon in an all-encompassing view. But the lightning threat prohibited serious study. Mostly I remember my somewhat frantic picture-taking, my fear that the register sheets would blow from my hands out into space, and trying to imagine from a bloodthirsty lightning bolt's point of view the attractiveness of my bald spot.

We are just 2.5 miles from Cape Royal, yet nearly two hard days are required to get us back to the Rim. We carry water from the Vishnu Canyon spring to a camp on a dry saddle beneath Angels Window. Straight above us, behind metal railings, we can make out clean and tidy tourists. For their consideration, Coltrin finds it fulfilling to boom out with his most authoritative heavenly voice, "PLEASE . . . STEP BACK . . . FROM THE RIM."

At 3 P.M., we, too, are just tourists on the Rim standing in the golden glow of quaking aspens in late September. But as I drive home through the dazzling trees, they seem overdone; my few minutes on the summit of mighty Vishnu has numbed and humbled normal passions.

Do I enjoy dodging lightning bolts? Of course not. But in our scuffle with inscrutable forces on that skyscraping peak, we held our own. I admit, we were lucky, but luck is an active partner in all endeavors. And, as Winston Churchill once observed, "Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result." AH