Escape

Cast in a shadow, some 20-feet above was an alcove of sorts. I bagged my gear, swung it over my good shoulder and proceeded to haul myself up along the nearly smooth canyon walls.

The alcove was not much more than a flat surface with enough room for shelter once I pulled my knees to my chest. I made immediate use of the flat space by laying on my stomach with my rucksack’s straps wrapped around my wrist.

Whether disjointed or not, I figured that I could use the weight of my pack to bring my shoulder back into place and to catch some much-needed rest while I waited for the joint to reduce. It wasn’t long before a searing pain awakened me when my shoulder returned to its natural position with a dull-pop.

Able to look up with a fair amount of comfort, I couldn’t tell how far I had fallen. The best I could do was guess that the plunge was between 80 and 100 feet.

It was closing in on nighttime, so I decided to use the last few minutes of light to stretch my legs and to look for an exit to the slot. Not to far from the alcove I heard the first, faint sounds of impending danger – water dripping more and more rapidly.

By the time I realized how much danger I was in, the water was rushing around my ankles, pulling at my boots. I raced back towards the alcove, climbing out of torrent of water that grabbed violently at my thighs and threatened to complete the job that the fall hadn’t.

Without much light I was unable to see the water as it edged closer and closer to precarious rock perch. All I could do was listen to its thunderous roar and pray that it would stop before reaching me as I had no place else to go.

But like all gully washers that occur somewhere higher in the rocky formations, the rain didn’t last and soon the roar dropped away to a slight dripping. By that time though, my ears rang violently, as if I’d stood next to a fighter jet preparing to take off.

I let the ringing and whooshing in my already aching head lull me into a sleep.

The following morning, a brightness shined directly on my spot in the wall. Below me, I saw no sign of water, let alone a flash flood – the sand and the rocks had drunk their fill and all was dry again.

Hungry, I pulled some food from my pack and ate before climbing down. I was terribly sore throughout my body following the events from the day before – but I knew I had to find a way out of the canyon before the sun reached its skyward zenith.

The sand showed signs of downward movement, marking the way to go to find a way to the outside. The slot was long, perhaps a mile, maybe less and it emptied through a very narrow opening, which made sense about how quickly the water had risen the night before.

The gap between the sandy ground and the rocky ceiling of the opening was so small that I had to dig down to make enough room for my body to slide through. Once I figured I had enough room to squirm through the hole, I wrapped my rucksack around my left ankle and slipped into the waiting sunshine.

Clear of the canyon and clear of the hole, I had one more danger to contend with and that was the troublemakers with their buggies. I sat quietly for half-an-hour listening for the sound of an engine and enjoying the warmth of the sun.

Soon it was clear that I was alone and that I was free to move swiftly to the nearest roadway. Still, I remained on alert for the sight or the sound of a dune buggy as I made my way across the warming desert floor.