Finding Jim (8 page)

A whiteout greeted us the next day, and Jim led blindly up a bowl as snow cascaded from the steep cliffs around us. He chose a place to set up camp, and I asked him if we were safe from avalanches. “I think so.” I slept lightly, poised to abandon camp if the roar of the falling snow came too close. In the morning, the sun hit the tent and after we dug ourselves out, we saw that we were camped on the only raised knoll in the whole basin, somewhat protected from the avalanches.

The 600-vertical-metre ski down the Beas Kund, our only ski run of the trip, was heavy with new snow. With a rope, Jim lowered Rob down the steep gully entrance to check the stability, and we followed. There was so much snow and so many hazards above us that we traversed back and forth across the slope all the way to the bottom.

From Manali we travelled south and visited the Taj Mahal and rode elephants in Corbet Park looking for tigers. In Nepal we trekked in the beautiful Langtang Valley, home of the monster rhododendrons. Jagged snow-covered peaks speared the sky. Before heading back to Canada, we rafted Nepal's Karnali River.

Neither of us were water experts, so we decided to hire a company. A 20-hour bus ride and two days of trekking later, we arrived at the put-in for the Karnali River. The lead raft guide took one look at the river level and said, “Holy shit, I've never seen the water so high. It's really pushy.”

As the guides worked to prepare the rafts, they noticed we were short one life jacket. The Nepalese fellow who would steer the gear raft drew the short straw, and the rest of the crew wrapped him in a foam sleeping pad and some duct tape, hoping that would keep him afloat if an accident occurred.

The guides piled the gear in the middle of the rafts. Seven clients sank into the sponsons around the edge of each boat, toes hooked under a rope to keep from falling backwards. There was only room for six people, but we crammed in.

We began the trip with three strikes against us: heavy boats, one man without a life jacket and an abnormally high, fast-flowing river. We would be on the river for 10 days and navigate 20 rapids, some as difficult as Class
IV
plus. The international scale of river difficulty describes Class
IV
using words such as “dangerous,” “boiling” and “violent.” Ignorance was bliss for me. It didn't occur to me that an established rafting company recommended by a North American guide would put its clients at risk. At the time, I did not know that liability is less stringent in Nepal than in Canada and that companies do not rely on return clientele.

On the first day, we stopped at the only village we would see for the next several days. The guides bought a live chicken and strapped it face down, clucking, to the front of the gear raft.

The Karnali ripped 20 of us from our rafts that day. Some people floundered in the pumping, grey-brown river for more than three kilometres before a guide caught up to them and pulled them out. The metallic taste of the silt water lingered in my mouth until after dinner.

On our second day on the river, the group crouched around the sandy campsite listening to the lead guide.

“The river is down 1.5 metres this morning, so it won't be as pushy or as fast. We are going to stay closer together today and be more careful.”

People murmured. We knew what lay ahead: a snaking canyon four kilometres long whose vertical rock walls blocked the sun and strangled the river into frothing whitewater areas called God's House, Flip 'n' Strip, and Juicer.

“I know there is talk going around. People are scared about what happened yesterday. But we've got everything under control. Today will be better.”

People spoke in hushed voices as we boarded the rafts and pushed off into the current. Downriver we heard what sounded like the roar of a waterfall. Rounding a corner, the water picked up speed. Our raft plunged first into the boiling rapids and a wave higher than the length of our five-metre boat reared up in front of us.

“Paddle!” the guide yelled as we hit a wall of water. The wave pushed our raft vertical to the sky and we stalled. In that second, I saw the cavernous black hole on the backside of the wave. I groped at air with my paddle. And then I plummeted.

Our raft went end over end. All I could see were bubbles and black. When I surfaced and opened my mouth for air, another wave slammed me back under. I thrashed. My life jacket fought against the sucking action of the river and pulled me to the surface in what seemed like slow motion. I remembered the instructions the guides gave us in case we tipped: “Hold on to your paddle. Try to grab hold of the side of the boat and then try to get on top of the boat to help the guide flip it back over.” I grabbed the side of our overturned raft and the guide pulled me on top, along with one other rafter. Water streamed from his face and hair as he shouted, “Reach down and hold onto the cord alongside the boat!” We mimicked his actions and squatted to grab the elastic cord. “Okay, now on the count of three, pull up and lean back hard!” he commanded. We obeyed, and by the time I realized what was going on, it was too late. We catapulted back into the river. I squeezed my paddle and lunged for the side of the raft again. The guide was already inside and hauled me up by the life jacket. Instinctively, I scanned the waves for others who needed rescue. Within five minutes we had the whole team aboard and were plunging our paddles into the water.

A dozen strokes later our guide pushed his whole weight into the rudder and shouted for the people on the left to paddle hard. The raft was too heavy for a last-minute change in direction. The river swept us toward a “hole,” a “keeper,” a whirlpool that sucks things in and swirls them around underwater like a washing machine and spits them out or, sometimes, keeps circulating them.

The hole vacuumed the left side of our raft and dragged me underwater. Kicking with my legs and beating my arms, I surfaced underneath the raft. I gulped some air and forced myself underwater again and groped my way out. I hung on to the cord on the side of the raft and tried to catch my breath as water crashed against my face. There were two people beside me and three across from me. One woman's face was ashen. “It's going to be okay!” I yelled at her but she barely nodded.

A wave tore at our cold, tightly curled fingers. I clung to the stretched cord as the water bent me backward, gushed over my closed mouth and eyes and pulled at my hair before releasing me back to the side of the boat. When I opened my eyes, I was the only one left clinging to the raft. I gasped for air through chattering teeth as water bottles, Teva sandals and paddles cruised by. Two rafters marooned on a log mid-river called for help. I surveyed the angry water. One, two, three, four, five overturned rafts. Even the gear boat was stuck on the rocks.

Our guide's arms cut through the frothy water. He manteled himself onto the raft in one swift motion, told me to look out, righted the raft by himself and climbed back in within seconds. He hauled me in along with four others. We had three paddles for six people. I paddled as hard as I could to shore. Just before we landed, I peppered the guide, “Did you see Jim?”

He looked everywhere but at me and mumbled, “He went in the hole.” My mouth went dry.

As the rest of the boats limped in one by one, I asked if anyone had seen Jim. I craned my neck and saw him slumped in the last raft. Jim's features were blank, as if he had seen a ghost. I hugged him but his body moved away restlessly, and he muttered something about a warm jacket. I draped my fleece over his shoulders as he sat down and started to whittle a piece of driftwood. I sat beside him.

“Are you okay?” I whispered.

He focused on the piece of wood as he spoke in almost a childlike voice, “Yeah, yeah, um, I went into the hole.”

I leaned closer so that we were touching and asked, “What happened?”

He pushed the knife rhythmically down the driftwood and explained, “At first I tried to fight to the surface but that seemed to plunge me deeper, so I made myself go limp. The river played with me, swirled me around and around for what seemed like at least five minutes. Just when I felt my lungs would burst, that I couldn't hold on any longer, the river let me go and I floated to the surface.”

Jim turned his head slowly to look into my eyes and shuddered. “It's the closest I've ever felt to dying.” I bit my lip and squeezed him closer to me. My body sagged. We were not safe. I had almost lost him.

Over the next five days we flipped five more times. On the final day, as the river widened into a lazy flow with not a ripple in sight, we splashed each other to ease the intense heat and the tension of the trip. Several people dove in and when one woman was inadvertently jostled overboard, she began to shake and scream. Her husband bent quickly to haul her out. Jim would later submit an article about the trip to an outdoor magazine, but they responded that the story was not believable.

After five months on the road, we touched down on Canadian soil and heaved a sigh. Clean air, mountains that beckoned and a language our brains could compute effortlessly. But we weren't home long before we headed off on another adventure. Two months remained before my teaching term began.

We drove 22 hours north in our own province of British Columbia to the Spatsizi River. We rented a canoe and drove to the put-in where we began our 10-day trip. The most difficult rapid we ran was Class
III
, but the consequences of an accident were severe given the remoteness of our location. Our only link to the outside world was a hunters' lodge halfway down the river, but it was early in the season and we did not expect anyone to be there. The sun shone every day and a chill in the air kept the bugs at bay. Each morning we loaded the canoe and covered our gear with a green tarp to protect it from waves. The first few days were mellow and we dipped our paddles lazily. Caribou wandered close to the shore to drink, and we marvelled at their fuzzy antlers. We camped on sandbars to avoid the bears and wolves. In the evenings, we sat on our fold-up chairs and watched the sunset. I was exactly where I wanted to be with exactly the right person.

One afternoon we stopped to have lunch and I disappeared into the tangled alder to go to the bathroom. Jim's yell pierced the silence: “Sue! Sue! Bear!” I waddled as quickly as I could back into the open, pulling up my pants as I went, and met Jim, who was backing away from the brush toward the river.

“What happened?” I panted. Jim's face was a chalky white. He kept his eyes riveted to the same spot in the trees, directly behind our picnic area.

“I heard this rustle right behind me and at first I thought it was you, so I didn't do anything. But then the sound was getting closer and I thought that it was weird that you would go to the bathroom right behind me, so I turned around. And he was right there, this black bear. He raised his big furry head, and we were almost nose-to-nose. That's when I leaped up and called to you. The bear turned tail and ran. I think he was pretty scared too!” The bear must have swum over from the mainland. We made a mental note to be on the lookout for animals, even on the sandbars.

Our guidebook indicated we would encounter a Class 
II
plus rapid on day three. As we navigated a bubbly rocky section, we saw up ahead that the river widened and turned a 90° bend. The waves stood up at this point and a wall of striated rock blocked the river's course. I spread my knees wide on the scratchy floor of the fibreglass canoe to balance against the roll of the waves, and I raised my voice to compete with the roaring water.

“Rock river right!” I yelled.

“Got it,” Jim replied. Faster and faster the river pulled us toward the rock wall, where it rushed up the sides before heading right. We fought the current to avoid being sucked against the wall. “Draw,” Jim commanded. “Draw!” Jim yelled more insistently.

“I am!” I yelled back as the water splashed over the gunwales of the canoe.

“I mean cross-bow draw,” Jim corrected himself. We drew closer to the wall. “Paddle harder, Sue!” We both dug in, but the boat seemed to stall for a few very long seconds before edging forward away from the wall. My shoulders relaxed. If something happened to Jim and me out here, it would be days before anyone even thought to look for us.

The river widened and meandered through marsh, sandbars and forested banks. I leaned back against the mound of gear and dangled my legs over either side of the canoe, dipping my paddle with one hand. Jim chuckled behind me, “I guess that's why they call it the divorce boat!”

On the contrary, my relationship with Jim matured when we faced discomfort and fear together. I learned that I could depend on him under pressure. I learned that he loved me when I was not at my best; when I was scared and withdrew and put the responsibility on others. When I was not perfect. I had felt so vulnerable and imperfect on Kilimanjaro, trying to keep up with Jim. I knew now that being vulnerable allowed our love to grow.

After our river trip, we ate and slept for 24 hours at our bed and breakfast before boarding a floatplane to the foothills of Mount Edziza.

Rainwater funnelled down the sleeve of my jacket as I pushed through the dense salal, head lowered and doing my best to ignore the wet squelching sound of my socks inside my leather hiking boots. Under my breath I counted out 30-second intervals punctuated by a shocking toot of my air horn. Around each corner, my steps faltered and my head whipped from side to side in search of dark masses among the thick, shoulder-high brush. I stopped short in front of a steaming pile of bear scat and crinkled my nose at the acrid smell of wet fur and urine hanging in the air. If we surprised a grizzly on this narrow trail, hugged on both sides by tangled brush, there would be no escape.

After six hours of trudging uphill in a downpour, we broke out above treeline onto a moonscape of volcanic rock decorated with intermittent tufts of dry grasses. The black, grey and green striations flowed upward to the striking white snow of Mount Edziza. Brown fuzzy caribou shapes dotted the snow-covered gullies. We set up the tent and cooked dinner over the gas stove, mesmerized by the gentle movements of the caribou in the soft orange glow of the setting sun. Before bed I poked a needle into the bases of two bulging blisters on my heels.