River Rerun

Return to the River

Sixty years after Buzz Holstrom became the first person to successfully complete a solo run of the Colorado and Green rivers, a group retraces his steps THE CANYON SKY was still pitch-black when Buzz Holmstrom awoke on November 18, 1937. He had spent a long restless night under a rocky ledge to escape the wind and the rain. On this day he would encounter Lava Falls, the worst stretch of white water on the Colorado River, or on any other river he'd ever been on for that matter. Alone in the immense wilderness of the Grand Canyon, in a wooden boat, Holmstrom was fully aware that no one had yet successfully navigated the falls.

He shoved off at first light. Passing a huge pillar of lava in the middle of the river, he could hear the guttural growl of Lava Falls, still a mile downstream. After scouting from shore, he wrote in his journal: "Just might run, but it is very, very bad." Holmstrom ultimately decided against being a hero. He got some poles, unloaded his boat, then slid it down the boulder-strewn bank. Two and a half hours later, he had completed the portage. The next morning, after another miserable night, Holmstrom set off once again, knowing that he still faced a hundred miles of river before he emerged from the Grand Canyon.

Holmstrom did go on to make history as the first person to complete a solo run of the Colorado and the Green rivers traveling more than a thousand miles in two months. The following year, he returned and ran Lava Falls in his boat for filmmaker Amos Burg.

Sixty years later, we follow in Holmstrom's footsteps: 11 souls in five small rubber rafts - two red, two gray, one yellow. In camp the night before Lava Falls, everybody has a story about someone who flipped in the ledge hole, took a bad swim around the black rock or professed a near-death experience. My stomach flutters just thinking about it.The next morning, humor turns black and nervous energy abounds. The boatmen rig with extreme care, tugging every knot and buckle just a little tighter, stowing 'I think this river is not treacherous as has been said - Every rapid speaks plainly just what it is & what it will do to a person - if only one will read & listen carefully.' loose straps and lines, adjusting weight up front in the boats where it's needed. But procrastination only works so long, and finally the inevitable truth rears its head: We must go downstream. We spin out into the current, then float down a peaceful 8 miles and spy that same black pillar of lava Holmstrom saw. It's called Vulcans Anvil

and, as our boat skims by, I plant a kiss on it for good luck. We hear the ominous low roar, too, pull in on the left shore and tie the bowlines snug to a tamarisk. Everybody trots off to scout the rapid, except me. I've seen Lava Falls before - more than a 14-foot drop, with gnashing waves and vicious pour-overs throughout its quarter-mile length.

Each time my reaction is the same: There's no way to get through this right side up, I think.

After what seems like an eternity, the passengers return. Nanc Cole from Durango, Colorado, and Barbara Dewey, who lives on a farm in Ohio, buckle on their life jackets without a word. Katie Gooby of Flagstaff, who's seen Lava Falls before, too, slithers into her black wet suit. Bruce Berman from Philadelphia munches on trail mix. His friend Jerry Knutson, who holds the trip permit, gives some advice: If your boat is flung against the black rock at the bottom, resist your natural impulse to pull away and instead lean into the rock. Maybe the boat won't flip. Good advice, but to me it's like suggesting that when a grizzly bear attacks, you should curl up and remain silent. Finally the five who will row the boats through the falls, including my husband, Michael Collier, return, their countenances grim. This will be Michael's 38th run of Lava. Today he doesn't mince words: “It looks horrible.” With no hesitation, I agree when he offers to shuttle me over to the right shore so I can walk. I wish each boatman good luck, then depart for the long, hot stroll. Scampering up to a high rock, I have a bird's-eye view of the boats as they enter the rapid. Michael enters left, crashes into the first big waves straight on, then is nearly stopped cold by a gargantuan breaker. He hangs onto the oars, and the river freight-trains him to the right. Hugh Rieck, a sea-soned Grand Canyon river runner, enjoys a smoother course a little farther left. Dave Esposito from Tucson aces it. Byron Hayes of Flagstaff does the same. Dave Knutson, Jerry's brother, gets turned sideways at the top and, just as

he spins the boat around, a wave washes him overboard. I whisper a prayer. Dave clings to the boat, and regains his seat just before bouncing through the rooster-tail waves at the bottom of the rapid.

Once we're all reunited at what's called "Fat City," we pull over for lunch and congratulations all the way around. Dave imparts words of wisdom: "When you're going through Lava, you have a choice of staying in the boat or swimming; I've done both and my recommendation is to stay in the boat."

LAVA FALLS. The Colorado River. The Grand Canyon. It's a place of dreams, one of the last great wildernesses. At age 28, Buzz Holmstrom took on the challenge of running the Rio Colorado, a courageous and adventuresome decision. The Swedish family name Holmstrom means "home stream," and boats and moving water were a part of Haldane "Buzz" Holmstrom's life from the time he was born along a creek near the Oregon coast in 1909. As an athletic, smart and restless young man, Holmstrom found the lure of wild rivers irresistible. He experimented with homemade boats on the Rogue in Oregon and the Salmon in Idaho, then quietly decided to make his epic trip on the Green and the Colorado in 1937. Unable to persuade anyone else to go with him, he determined to go alone.

A single log of Port Orford cedar supplied the wood for the decked boat he designed and built, at a total cost of about $35. He quit his job as a gas station attendant in his hometown of Coquille, Oregon, towed the boat behind his old Dodge down to Green River, Wyoming, and launched there on October 8. He boated down the Green through the Gates of Lodore and Split Mountain, navigated the big drops of Cataract Canyon on the Colorado and floated through the gorgeous stretch of Glen Canyon. On November 8, Holmstrom arrived at Lee's Ferry, the put-in for Grand Canyon trips. At Marble Canyon Lodge, short on funds, he accepted the trader's kind offer of food for the final leg of his journey. We, on the other hand, are on a private trip with a National Park Service permit to travel 280 miles in 20 days. Jerry Knutson waited 10 years back in Pittsburgh for his name to come up on the list. As the scheduled date approached, meetings, phone calls and e-mails occupied our time. Spread sheets and a four-page, single-spaced list of gear made the rounds. Our menus feature steaks, paella, chile rellenos, French toast and fresh fruit, while Holmstrom dined mostly on beans, burned biscuits and raisins.

We have a mountain of gear - tables, chairs, ice-filled coolers, propane, umbrellas, solar showers, an espresso-maker and a blue-and-yellow-flowered cot immediately christened the "Barco-lounger." We assembled life jackets, patch kits, first-aid kits, spare oars, tarps, tents, buckets, Dutch ovens, water filter, firepan and a regiment of steel ammo cans to hold every bit of waste we generate. All told, we have enough stuff to pack a 26-foot rental truck. Holmstrom would have been aghast.

Still, we see mostly the same river and the same canyon he experienced, with one major addition: Glen Canyon Dam now holds back the Colorado River 15 miles above Lee's Ferry. The dam releases water from deep in Lake Powell, which means a huge difference for us downstream the water temperature hovers around 50 degrees, making a swim a numbing and possibly dangerous activity. Holmstrom's focus, not surprisingly, was the river and the rapids. He was on the water at dawn every day, usually traveling 25 or 30 miles. Our group, a bunch of forty-somethings on vacation, takes full advantage of our generous schedule. A long day for us is 10 miles on the water. We stop often to swim in the pleasantly cool pools in Silver Grotto, savor the clear water at Vaseys Paradise, read a book in the serene shade of Blacktail Canyon, lay over at Nankoweap and hike to granaries built high on cliffs a thousand years ago.

We share the same worry over certain rapids. Our first real challenge is House Rock with a gaping hole on the left that everyone wants to miss. Like Holmstrom, we scout it and have good runs. Hance Rapid, the first big water of the inner gorge, likewise deserves full attention. Downstream, we pause for a quick stop at Phantom Ranch, our only taste of civilization in three weeks. After we mail post-cards, make phone calls and sip ice-cold lemonade, we're ready to be on our way. Over the next two days, we face a quartet of serious rapids: Horn Creek - short and sweet; Granite huge and scary; Hermit five humongouss waves to avoid; and Crystal notoriously bad now, but hardly worth mention for Holmstrom.

And still, the river and its canyon bestow quiet, unexpected pleasures. Beavers sliding across the water; bats fluttering in the soft dusk; great blue herons rising ghostlike from the shore; bighorn sheep gamboling gracefully on the slopes; walls of limestone, sandstone and shale rising around us; exquisite sculptures of gleaming black schist decorating the depths of the inner gorge; the magical light and spectacular scenery changing with every hour and every mile; the inky night sky clouded with stars and streaked by an occasional brilliant meteor.

Holmstrom travels with us in the form of his journal, lent to me by Flagstaff boatman Brad Dimock. When Dimock first read Holmstrom's account of his solo trip, he was "transfixed by the humbleness and genius" of the words and was inspired to write and publish Holmstrom's biography. Though Holmstrom would never have thought so, Dimock considers him a "boatman's boatman."

But after his historic trip, Holmstrom never seemed content. He went from job to job and, under the patronage of a woman named Edith Clegg, navigated rivers all the way from the West to the East coasts. During World War II, he served in the Navy in Europe and the South Pacific, but did not see action. In 1946, back from the service, he signed on for a survey of the Grande Ronde River in northeast Oregon. The river was high and Holmstrom was apprehensive about his ability to pilot a boat down it safely. On May 18, 1946, Buzz Holmstrom was found dead beside the Grande Ronde River of a gunshot wound. The coroner ruled his death a suicide, though some family members and friends could hardly believe or accept it.

Less than 10 years earlier, Holmstrom had made his final journal entry, on November 21, 1937, below his last rapid on the Colorado River: "I had thought - once past there - my reward will begin - but now - everything ahead seems kind of empty and I find I have already had my reward - in the doing of the thing - the stars & cliffs & canyons - the roar of the rapids - the moon - the uncertainty - worry - the relief when through each one - the campfires at nite - the real respect & friendship of the river men I met & others."

"I think this river is not treacherous as has been said - Every rapid speaks plainly just what it is & what it will do to a person & a boat in its currents waves boils whirlpools & rocks - if only one will read & listen carefully."

In camp one evening, I read this passage aloud to my fellow travelers. My voice catches as I recite Holmstrom's words and realize what a treasure it is to still be able tomake this voyage on this great river through this grand canyon.

EDITOR'S NOTE: The Doing of the Thing: The Brief Brilliant Whitewater Career of Buzz Holmstrom, by Vince Welch, Cort Conley and Brad Dimock, is available through Fretwater Press, 1000 Grand Canyon Ave., Flagstaff, AZ 86001; www. fretwater.com.

For information about commercial and private boat trips on the Colorado River, call the Grand Canyon National Park River Trip Information Center, toll-free (800) 959-9164. AH