All Colorado River rafting adventures head downstream from Lee’s Ferry. The ferry formally opened in January 1873 and continued to run until Navajo Bridge opened in June 1929. It’s a cool bridge and now there are two! One for vehicles and one for pedestrians.
On our river trip, we were dropped off on one end and were encouraged to walk across to the other side, where we were picked up and shuttled to the put-in at Lee’s Ferry.
This image is looking upriver toward the ferry which is four miles away.
This is looking downstream under the vehicle bridge. It was cool to realize we would be floating on that water in just a couple of hours.
Putting padlocks on things is apparently a “thing”. I found these while walking across the bridge.
I just don’t get tired of this view.
The Colorado is known for the amount of silt it moves. In this image, you can see it suspended in the green water.
See those black dots on the bridge? Those are California Condors! This image is from a different trip but they do like to hang out under the bridge. I think on this day we saw as many as ten!
On either end, you can shoot across and capture both bridges in the same images. They look like they are floating.
I like shadows. I saw this pattern being made from the ramada roof on the side we walked to.
Now we are on the river and fast approaching the bridge. The beaches on this river are stunning…but that’s a blog for a different time.
The black and white makes it seem like an older image. Look at the water and how rough it looks. These are the spring winds notorious for this time of year.
As we passed under I noticed people on the bridge looking at us. I was amazed at how small they were. This is even zoomed all the way in!
And finally, approaching the bridges and as we float under you can see both bridges from the underside.
Every beach we stopped at for either lunch, camp or just a bathroom break seemed to have a welcoming committee of two Ravens.
They wandered camp and reminded folks to keep their belongings under lock and key, or at least secured in their dry bags.
Ravens are ballsy. This one snuck onto the boat with Amity, our river guide, standing right there, and hopped up and stole her granola bar! She was two feet, if that, away!
Here’s a pair checking out the beach to make sure everything is in order. They are smart, observant and brave.
At times I think they are more observant of their world than we humans are.
It didn’t take long before we saw our first group of bighorn sheep. I believe we saw some every day. The goal became to find ones with big horns.
This guy had a good set. We found one larger but the image was too blurry.
Here’s another pair I shot as we floated past.
At our last camp we watched Bighorn TV. It was great. We all lined up our chairs on a sandbar six inches under water and watched three sheep across the river negotiate the cliffs.
The deer weren’t as common. In fact, this may have been the only group we saw.
We found this guy at the Little Colorado. He was a juvenile and froze when we walked by. His mama came screaming out from the nearby cliff toward us to protect him. She stood her ground with us as baby wandered off to a safer location.
Look at the length of that tail!
I was out shooting rocks one morning, thinking I was alone. I went to steady myself on this rock and was surprised to find my little friend here. He never moved but had an eye on me the whole time.
This guy was a trained model. I found him while out shooting rocks and water in the morning light. He hung out, followed me and posed. His colors were beautiful.
Fire ants were pretty common in camp as well. The good news is they went to bed at sundown. A simple trap was also made. A small bowl was buried in the sand just at the level of the sand with a piece of food in it. The ants would drop down for the food and not be able to get out. Toward sundown, our guides would release the bowl full of ants back to the hill for bedtime.
No one on our trip fished. But I’m sure they would have had success had they attempted. This trout was patrolling the waters off of one of our lunch stops.
See the dark blob near the opposite canyon wall connecting the light and dark water? That’s a school of fish! Not sure what kind but at first glance it looked like some sort of plant life. This is at the mouth of Havasu Creek.
Snowy egrets…who knew? We also saw Great Blue Heron on several occasions.
These first three images are from the backhaul trip. It was my first experience seeing paddle boards on this river. They were fully loaded and had been camping. The thing that would hold me back from such an adventure is the fact that if you take a dive the water is a chilly 46 degrees coming out of the bottom of the dam.
Here is a collection of our own vessels taken on that trip. We had a couple of canoes, sea kayaks, regular kayaks and an inflatable kayak or two. People have been known to paddle upstream. They eddy hop, paddle from eddy to eddy to reach their destination. It’s hard but doable.
This area of the river, upstream from Lee’s Ferry, is famous and popular with the fly fishermen. It’s quite common to see motorboats heading upstream to fish. Companies also do a “daily” where they take passengers on large inflatable motor rigs down the 25 mile stretch of Glenn Canyon from the Dam to Lee’s Ferry. Those are the boats we load up and pay to haul our boats back up to the dam for a two-day float. We stay at the campgrounds along the river.
Here we are at the ferry on the morning of our launch. To my delight, an OARS Grand Canyon Dories trip was loading up and preparing to launch as well. I love these boats. They are my favorite on the river. They are made of wood and each one is a work of art. I drifted away from my group and couldn’t help myself. I had to shoot a few at the boat ramp.
My favorite picture is the one at the top of this post. Late in the trip we floated past several lined up on a beach. I was able to catch just the right angle of their pointed bows with their names painted on the sides.
They launched before we did so when we passed them I was able to capture them silently floating in the canyon while we motored past in our big, 36-foot inflatable S-Rig.
This boat has a long story attached to it. If you’re interested go to 
Kayaking is another popular way to experience this river but rest assured, the water is not always this smooth.
I like this image because it shows you the scale of Grand Canyon. The boats in the distance are two large motor rigs heading to camp in late afternoon. They look tiny.
This is the boat we traveled on, a 36-foot S-rig. No idea what the S stands for.
Shade is a premium while on the river, especially at camp. These boats had the right idea. Temperatures are many degrees cooler the closer to the water you get. One does not want to hang out on the hot sand in the sun until shade adorns the camp. Trust me on this one.
A lot of folks like to bring “duckies” on Canyon trips to float on the calmer sections of water. They tend to get loaded and tied down for the big rapids.
Here’s another boat seen on the river occasionally. It’s a bit of a catamaran; two pontoons connected with a deck for rowing and gear.
I’m going to end where I started, with my beloved dories. I’ve never ridden in one but I think they are such pretty boats. If you want a great dory story read The Emerald Mile by Kevin Fedarko, it’s amazing.