I arrived here a little after 830am and have been wandering around and taking photos. I left camp at 730am. I was up at 520am and had some oatmeal for breakfast and then packed up what I would need for today. I have food to have lunch down here. I am at the boat beach and have it to myself right now. The Colorado is still running thick and brown so no bathing in it this year for me. The river level is much lower and the rapids are crazy. It would be nice to see a river party come down to run them. It does not look like anyone was here last night. There were other campers at Monument Creek last night and they are supposed to be down here tonight.

Monument Creek camping area - 530pm

I am back at camp and got here a little before 4pm after leaving the river a little after 230pm. I had a very nice stay at the river and two river parties ended up coming through so I got my wish. The first one was a private trip and I had a nice time chatting with some of them while others went down to scout the rapids out. I got a can of ice cold orange soda, some sliced cheese and a large bag of pretzels stuffed with peanut butter. The ice cold soda really hit the spot. They kept offering me more food even though I told them I had my lunch with me. Did I look that hungry?

I got some very nice photos of them running through Granite Rapids and even had an email address to send them to. Once I got back to the boat beach I had my lunch, tuna roll-ups with chips again, but this time I had some cheese to add to them. I also snacked on a lot of the peanut butter filled pretzels.

The second trip was commercial, Grand Canyon Expeditions Company. They had five dories with them and two support rafts. The first trip that came through had two dories and five rafts. I had a nice time talking with one of the oars-people from the second trip. I told him about the trip we took with OARS way back when and he actually knew Robby and Fabry. Fabry is still working for OARS. I copped a beer (Coors) from the second trip.

I picked a good time to head back to camp as the canyon along Monument Creek was already mostly in shade. My campsite still had a little sun when I arrived here but that was gone in no time. I filtered water and also had a nice sponge bath before dinner, even washed my hair. Dinner tonight was Spicy African Peanut Stew with Sweet Potato by AlpineAir and it was quite good. Trying something new to eat on a backpacking trip is always a crap shoot and I've had a few that I've had to force down. I thought I was going to be here alone tonight but some people came in while I was eating my dinner.