Slot Canyons I: Buckskin Gulch
Our first experience with slot canyons started like most other days, except we were more sleepy and disgruntled than usual. The day before had been a nine-mile hike out of the Grand Canyon, and we were still feeling it. We hopped out of the van into a cold, blustery day. Everyone bundled up for the trip, wishing we were still in bed.

    There was no blazed trail to the slot canyon, so we followed a narrow footpath along a riverbed. They trail eventually faded away, and we had to make our own trail (something Sweeney was more than comfortable with).

    We soon arrived at the slot canyons, and even though we had been a tough crowd in the morning (and because we didn’t know what was to come in the afternoon), we forgot how tired we were.
The entire scene seemed otherworldly.
     We were fifty feet deep in a crack in the earth that was basically invisible to someone standing at normal ground level. Naturally, we climbed some walls,
took some pictures
and painted some faces.
   Unfortunately, the excursion through the slot canyons ended far too soon. Our attempts at crossing the small sea proved futile, and we were forced to turn back.
However, to make the return trip more interesting, we decided to take a different route to the van.
*         *           *
Two hours later, clapping, whistles, and yelling filled the air as the sun began to set. Tara led the noise-making in hopes of deterring any potential predators. Everyone had become a little nervous after we found a pile of bones.
Attempting to shortcut our way back to the van had failed, and we had to retrace our steps through what we feared to be dangerous territory.
Still, we  had no doubts about our fearless leader’s navigational ability, so we confidently followed Dr. Sweeney.

Although we had a couple of tense moments, we arrived at the van safely, without any wild animal attacks or serious injuries, ready for another day on (or preferably off) the trail.

Slot Canyons II: Lower Antelope Canyon

On the way from Page to Flagstaff, we made two stops: The Glen Canyon Dam and Lower Antelope Canyon.
For our first stop, we had a good dam guide, Duane, to give us a good dam tour. Duane had worked as an electrical engineer at the dam for almost forty years. He first took us over the top of the dam and explained the construction process, which was completed in 1963. Over 700 million tons of concrete were required to create the massive dam, which controlled the flow of the Colorado River. He told us that if the dam collapsed, the water pressure would lead to a 100 foot wall of water rushing at 400 miles per hour. The water would reach the Grand Canyon (which is 80 miles away) in fifteen minutes.
Duane then took us to the turbines, which were 512 feet below the top of the dam. He explained that the eight huge turbines provide electricity to a range of over 200 square miles, and Glen Canyon can make electricity cheaper than any other hydroelectric source in the area. Besides giving us quite a bit of interesting information, he told us a few good dam jokes. He even let us take a selfie with him.

After Glen Canyon, we stopped at the Lower Antelope Canyon. The Navajo tribe owns Lower Antelope Canyon and does not allow tourists to explore it without a native guide. Instead of Dr. Sweeney, Shushi, a young Navajo man, would lead us through the canyon.
From the earth’s surface, Antelope Canyon was not very impressive. Standing right next to it, a person might not even notice it existed.
But we could tell it was going to be a special place when Shushi pointed out fossilized dinosaur tracks on a several hundred million year-old rock. We took dozens of pictures before we even made it to the canyon.
     Shushi led us down five flights of metal stairs bolted into the canyon wall. In less than a minute, we were 105 feet below the surface of the Earth.
     Antelope Canyon was even more incredible than the slot canyons we had seen two days before. Shushi told us the Navajo folklore about the sandstone formations, pointing out the “Lady of the Wind,” an eagle, and a Native chief, to name a few.
    He took some pictures of us in cool places.
   Shushi even played us a song on the Native American flute.

Finally, Shushi described how many of the rock structures in the area had formed. First, he poured water into a small heap of sand to show how sand dunes became saturated with water and dried in the sun. After his sand pile had dried, he scraped the sand away from the base, showing that wind blew the surrounding sand away from the solid structure. Finally, more wind and water shaped the exposed sandstone into the formations that we see today.
Glen Canyon and Lower Antelope Canyon were truly incredible, especially with Duane and Shushi as our guides. We got to see two marvels, one man-made and the other natural. It really gave us a better appreciation for both the power of nature and the impact that humanity can have upon it.

Norm, for The X-Treme Dream Team

The Extreme Dream Team went on an overnight trip to the Grand Canyon. We were excited to see some amazing views, put our physical fitness to the test, and experience some of the physiological phenomena we’d been studying throughout the course. The Grand Canyon is located at the northern edge of Arizona. Carved by the Colorado River and other geological forces, it is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide, and a mile deep. Nearly five million people visit the canyon annually, but as we later learned, only about one percent of them hike all the way to the bottom, as we planned to do.

Our chosen route was the South Kaibab trail. Created in the 1920s, the trail winds down 7.1 miles to our destination – Phantom Ranch – at the bottom. Looking down from the trailhead, the vastness of the canyon was awe-inspiring. The bottom couldn’t be seen from up there, just the canyon stretching out for miles. My first glimpse left me speechless, and as we began to hike down I was completely mesmerized by it. I was brought back to the real world by the smell of mule droppings that happen to line the trail and the sensation of the eccentric contractions in my leg muscles from walking only downward for miles. We saw many other adventurers hiking in either direction along the trail and we were sometimes passed by mules carrying passengers or cargo. The views were incredible, and we stopped to take countless photographs that could never live up to seeing the real thing in person. As we trekked downward, we noticed the types of rocks changing and the differences in vegetation and temperature. The world at the top was completely different from what we found as we descended. And talk about feeling small? The dots in the lower part of the picture below: that’s us!

We crossed the Colorado River and reached Phantom Ranch after nearly five hours of hiking. Phantom Ranch is the only lodging located in the bottom of the canyon. There is limited space, so reservations have to be made more than a year ahead of time. The ranch has cabins for people to sleep in and a main building that’s a cafeteria, gift shop, hangout spot – and probably other functions – rolled into one. We were happy to have a hearty meal prepared by someone other than ourselves after a long day of hiking. We had beef stew, vegetarian chili, salad and cornbread; and some of us tried the Grand Canyon Sunset Amber Ale—because what’s cooler than having a beer at the bottom of the Grand Canyon?

After dinner, we played games in the main building, bought souvenirs, and wrote postcards for our loved ones which would be carried out by mules and mailed the next day.

After eating breakfast and grabbing our pre-made sack lunches, we started our way up the canyon. We used the Bright Angel Trail to come up. The trail follows Bright Angel Creek and offers views that are completely different than those we encountered descending the South Kaibab trail.

As we hiked up, our group of twelve settled into smaller subsets: the trailblazers led the way, the photographers took their time in back, and the rest of the crew fell somewhere in between.

I soon found myself in a situation rarely experienced during a travel course with twelve people – solitude. I hiked the beginning part of the trail just out of sight of the group ahead of me and just out of earshot of the group behind. This let the experience sink in and allowed me to reflect on how incredible this whole trip has been.

As the hike continued, we found ourselves traversing many steep switchbacks that tired us out. We reached the top in under five hours and celebrated the completion of such an awesome journey.

Liz, for the Extreme Dream Team

The following is a summary, presented by Gabby and Courtney, of the first half of “King of the Mountains: Tibetan and Sherpa Physiological Adaptations for Life at High Altitude Edward T. Gilbert-Kawai, James S. Milledge, Michael P.W. Grocott and Daniel S. Martin” (Physiology 29:388-402, 2014)

Tibetans and Sherpas have lived at over 13,000 feet of elevation for over 500 generations, thus giving them plenty of time to develop an evolutionary advantage to the hypoxic environment in which they live. The purpose of this review was to identify the physiological differences between Sherpa/Tibetan populations living at high altitude, compared to lowlanders who ascend to and acclimate to high altitude. For the purpose of the review, Tibetans and Sherpas were considered as a single population and will be referred to as Sherpas for the rest of this summary.

The typical primary response to ascent to high altitude – in order to compensate for the lower oxygen content of the high altitude air – is to hemoconcentrate; that is, to increase red blood cell production and thus increase the number of red cells per ml of blood, thereby raising oxygen carrying capacity. Because hemoconcentration also increases blood viscosity, this compensatory response would, on a chronic basis, represent a cardiovascular risk factor by increasing cardiac workload.

Through evolutionary pressures, Sherpas have developed alternative adaptations to high altitude. Sherpas are found not to hemoconcentrate at altitude. Instead, they increase their blood flow rate; they develop larger chest circumference and lung volumes to increase surface area for diffusional exchange; and they have a lower ventilatory recruitment threshold during exercise (since they work on an oxygen sensing mechanism rather than the CO2 dependent sensing mechanism of lowlanders). Sherpas also do not show hypoxic pulmonary vasoconstriction, which is common in lowlanders who ascend. This prevents in Sherpas the increased cardiac afterload that is typical in chronically adapted lowlanders; consequently, Sherpas are less likely to develop myocardial hypertrophy, a risk factor for cardiovascular dysfunction. Sherpas also show an increased ability to metabolize glucose as a substrate in place of fatty acids (glucose yields more ATP per molecule of oxygen than do fatty acids).

Pregnant Sherpa women also show the ability to divert a larger amount of blood flow and blood volume to the uterine artery, lessening premature births and miscarriages compared to chronically adapted lowlanders. On the other hand, the review found that there was no difference between Sherpas and lowlanders in the hypoxic ventilatory response to ascent and no differences in arterial oxygen saturation. With continued human hypoxic research, it is hoped that advances in the prevention and care of hypoxemic critically ill patients can be achieved.

We started the day with such promise- it was the first day we actually made it out of the house on time for the day’s adventures. Those who could ski a black diamond trail ascended to the 11,510 feet summit of Arizona Snowbowl to measure spirometry. However, our great feeling of being on time quickly subsided as we realized we had forgotten the laptop for the measurements. Fortunately, we were still able to measure our breathing rate, pulse, and arterial O2 saturation at the mountain peak before hitting the slopes.

With the measurements done, we were free for the real fun: skiing and boarding. Those who did not ascend to the summit began polishing their skiing and snowboarding on the bunny slopes, while those at the top put their skills to the test. We tackled ungroomed black diamonds.

Facing moguls and steep slopes, we descended to the lesser intermediate trails. Here we split. Those fearless enough to stay on the black diamonds trekked back up the mountain while the others cruised around the blues. 

After a few tough hours on the slopes we were glad to break for lunch. Despite forgetting my sandwich in the frantic scramble out of the house, I was excited for the change of pace from cold turkey and cheese. The hot chicken tenders and fries from the lodge were just what I needed to warm me from all the snow that found its way into my jacket.

With our stomach’s full, we went back out. We met up on the bunny hill and were surprised to see how far the new skiers and boarders had come. After learning for only a few hours, they were making ’S’s like pros. Gabby even ditched the bunny trail to go on a intermediate slopes with Marissa and me. However, for some unknown reason, the trails were cut in half, so people could practice moguls. Despite this horrific setback, with some coaching from Marissa and me, Gabby fearlessly skied/slid her way down the trail.

Check out The GoPro View

With fresh snow and beautiful weather we were sad to call it a day.

Until next time

-Doug & the rest of the Extreme Dream Team