If you’re desperately in need of some soul-searching, I would recommend the Grand Canyon.
My fourth time in this magnificent landscape brought back the purest form of myself. Speaking from experience, you turn into a different person once you walk up to the edge of that big ditch. You always discover things in the deepest corners of who you are. You leave a stronger and more aware version of your previous self. It’s just what the Grand Canyon does to you.
Four friends and I gathered up only our necessary belongings and made the 12-hour pilgrimage from Boulder, Colorado to the North Rim. We walked down to Bright Angel Point just before the suns rays began to paint its incredible shadows along the canyon walls. After an emotional hour at the rim, we drove another forty miles west down a dusty dirt road to park our cars. The road ended there.
Two days later we had descended through the brutal Redwall Limestone and arrived at Thunder River Falls. We stood right at its foot, in the mist and cool breeze and were in awe of the amount of water rushing from a spring buried in the Muav Limestone several hundred feet above us. After a few quick rinses, we followed Thunder down to its confluence with Tapeats Creek, and continued all the way to the mighty Colorado River, deep in the bottom of the grandest canyon on Earth.
I instantly dropped my pack in the sandy camp, said nothing to my friends, switched into my Chacos and headed for the river. I found a big boulder near the shore and climbed on top. A decent-sized rapid lay in front of me, Tapeats Creek Rapid, and it all began flooding back.
The sound of the river, its smell, the glassy surface of the tongue of a rapid, its lines, its features, the adrenaline, the joy, the boatmen who inspire with words like “listen to the river, listen for its voice, listen to what the river is trying to say to you”.
There were so many thoughts and memories and feelings running through my head at the sight of the Colorado, and at the same time—there was nothing. No thoughts, just the river. I walked down river a ways until I found a large beach covered in footprints, undoubtedly a campsite for river runners. I sat down in the sand and began humming “Stairway to Heaven”. I was so present.
The Colorado River has served as my source of inspiration for a few years now, as it all started on my first river trip through the Grand Canyon with my family in the summer of 2016. A year later on the river, I found my motto, “don’t fight the river”, and laying on that beach near Tapeats Creek by myself I found new meaning in that little phrase.
The river is more than just an allegory for life. The river is who I want to be. Always moving, always flowing, independent, strong and consistent. People dam rivers, restrain it and control it. But in the end, the river is bigger than anything humanity can fathom. Its spirit can never be contained.
I stood up, smiled at the reflection of the canyon walls on the river, and walked back to my friends at camp to start dinner. There will be more time for soul-searching tomorrow.