Help

A few hours after the Kobae adventure, Scott, a guest called from the Condo on the walkie. Said somebody from across the river was calling for help. Jake and Jesse took a side by side and headed for the boat house and I headed to the Last Hurrah side of the property to make sure all our guests were accounted for. They were. The male voice calling for help could only say Help and Ouch indicating to me he was in the tamarisk on the far side of the river. I joined Jesse and Jake at the boat house with Jax of course. When I turned off my headlamp I was stunned at twice the stars in the sky as it was even darked than the lodge and all the stars were reflecting off the river. I hadn't been there at night in many years. We all took turns trying to talk to the guy on the other side but he wasn't cooperating. I first thought that he had wandered up from The Ranch. He was probably half mile north of where the last dome was before the flood waters came and he was drunk or high. Mostly help and ouch were about all we got of him. Jesse and Jake stayed at the boat house and Jax and I came back to the lodge. I called the San Juan County Sheriff office and the dispatcher put me through to the sheriff closest to me. This all took place over four hours on Tuesday night and all in the dark. I think Jake has some pictures or video and when I get a location for it I"ll pass it on. I have pictures of Jax and my hike this evening so that's what's going between the narrative.

The deputy called and said he was enroute to the Pot Ash road but would lose service shortly. I had just sent Jesse and Jake over in a double kayak with lots of headlamps but to stay in the river. We don't know what we have in the tamarisk. I suggested to the deputy that there was a way to get close by going up to Pot Ash Point and taking a rough road down the hill to the tamarisk. I ask him to send Life Flight. He called me back and said they were putting a crew together for the helicopter.

I could hear the kayak paddles cutting through the water as Jesse and Jake approached the Help guy. They were shining lights into the tamarisk and asking for his location but weren't getting much cooperation. The deputy said he was about to lose service in the canyon but would call me if he got an ETA before he lost it. Jesse and Jake had made contact and were pretty sure he was injured so I told them to go ahead and pull up on the embankment. They found him and he was a mess with lots of blood. The phone rang and the deputy said Life Flight's ETA was fifteen minutes. I updated him on the medical situation. I ask if the pilot wanted white lights or red or blinking red? He said blinking red. They guys had taken several head lamps with them and were making a location perimeter. Jake gave me GPS coordinates from his phone and the deputy forwarded them to the Life Flight pilot. I let the guys know it was 15 minutes ETA and I would walkie them when I saw the lights coming over Three Guys on a Roller Coaster where they have come over many times in my 17 years here.

It was a beautiful night. Dark and the sky was amazing with a meteor every 10 to 15 minutes. Jax and I sat on the couch and watched the lights on the other side of the river as we all waited for the wap, wap, wap of the blades coming into the valley. I knew I'd hear them before I saw them as it's always been like that. Jax was alert to all around us. The moon was just coming up at the same time starting to light up the Dead Horse Point side of the valley. I heard the blades. Two baby skunks came walking down the back porch towards Jax and I.

I called the guys on the walkie and told them the helicopter was coming in while telling Jax at the same time to be nice and not to move. The pilot saw the red flashing headlamps and headed for the clearing but didn't quite fit and came up and did it again. I heard the blades shut down. They said the blowing dust was intense.

It was an intense quiet all across the valley. Then two Canada geese somewhere down on the river got into 30 seconds of yelling at each other. The baby skunks froze about three feet from us. We were all frozen. I could hear a little chatter across the river at the injury site. The skunks turned around and went back down the stairs. So quiet and so beautiful. The guys called on the walkie to say they were loading the injured guy on the helicopter and I saw the lights start blinking and could hear the blades whirring picking up speed. The helicopter rose up and headed back over Three Guys on a Roller Coaster and was gone. I could hear Jesse and Jake splashing around up river somewhere and they called to say they were kayaking back to the boat ramp. Jax and I heard the side by side start up and saw them coming up the gravel hill so we came back inside. We talked for a few minutes and all went to bed.