Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

From June 28th through July 3rd, I had the privilege of being on a raft on the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. This was part of a family trip “for the guys.” On a trip put together by my father-in-law Allan, his two sons, me (a son in law), my three sons, two other grandsons, one grandson-in-law, and one great grandson spent five days and five nights on the Colorado River. These blog posts are part of the story.

Before going any farther into the canyon and the story, I pause to list the people who went on the Tour West trip.

The Tour West Crew:

• (1) Jake – river runner on the other raft
• (2) Collin – guide on the other raft
• (3) Karen – helper on the other raft
• (4) Andy – river runner on our raft
• (5) Scott – helper on our raft

The Passengers:

• (6) my father-in-law
• (7) brother-in-law #1
• (8) brother-in-law #2
• (9) nephew #1
• (10) nephew #2
• (11) great-grandson (son of nephew #1), 10 years old
• (12) nephew-in-law (I think that is what you call the son-in-law of brother-in-law #1)
• (13) son #1
• (14) son #2
• (15) son #3
• (16) me

All of the above road on our raft all week.

• (17) Australian dad
• (18) Australian mom
• (19) Australian son, a.k.a “Outback Zach”, about 12 years old
• (20) Australian daughter, about 8 years old
• (21) Canadian tomato farmer (lady)
• (22) mother of Canadian tomato farmer
• (23) daughter of Canadian tomato farmer, about 12 years old
• (24) Boston husband
• (25) Boston wife
• (26) Boston son
• (27) girl friend of Boston son (“no ring yet, but no pressure”)
• (28) L.A. lawyer #1 – talkative
• (29) L.A. lawyer #2 – quiet and carried a great Canon camera
• (30) Yorktown social worker (her)
• (31) Miami eye doctor (her)

Persons (7) through (31) road on the other raft all week.

And we had one more part-time passenger – a female Park Service employee. She was with us from launch on Monday morning for 24 hours. We left her on a beach campground. I trust that the next rafting group picked her up as scheduled.

Sigh, I feel like I just wrote a couple more verses to the theme song of Gilligan’s Island.

I hope I have this list correct. I also trust that none of my nicknames hurts anyone’s feelings and that my guess of the kids’ ages are close enough. I mean no harm. It was a pleasure to be on the river with the these fine people for a week.