Day Eight: 222 mile – Lake Mead take out.
They are camped at mile 222 tonight. I know this because they called! Twice! The conversations lasted a bit longer this time, but not much. First conversation was with my Dad, the second was with Paul.
— They visited Pumpkin Spring (no, they didn’t drink the water) but climbed up to a ledge and jumped, all three of them together, into the water below. They can’t wait to see the picture of it.
— They wanted to know where the helicopter pad was that we landed on in 2004. [Backstory: one of my Dad’s Naval Academy classmates runs a helicopter company out of Las Vegas. In May of 2004, all seven of us (Mom, Dad, me, Paul, Skip, Emily, and a six-month old Will) flew out to Las Vegas and took an all day tour. We had lunch in the Grand Canyon, flew over Bryce, and then over Zion… including an incredible fly-over of the Narrows and right over Angel’s Landing. It was spectacular.] I’d plotted the helipad the night before and was able to look on Google Earth and figure out the location for them. They’ll pass it tomorrow.
— Tomorrow, they raft to Separation Canyon, then get picked up by speed boats who will fast-track them to Pearce Ferry, where they will get the bus back to Las Vegas. They will meet the speed boats around 9am and then have another 2 or so hours until Pearce Landing.
Paul said that he’d missed the kids, badly, since about Day 3 or 4. I mentioned that Kate had just thrown up and Will had just had an accident… “do you still miss them?” This information didn’t deter his desire to be back here with them, though. Good thing, because I think my Mom and I are hopping on a cruise once we pick up Paul and Dad from the airport.
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