It's been a month since my expedition through the Grand Canyon. I've had time to look through the images and reflect on the experience. As mentioned previously, I had been down the Colorado about 10 years earlier with a group of geology students. For a photographer that experience was fun but frustrating. But the logistics were simple:....a Mamiya 645, a small tripod, a couple of extra batteries, and several rolls of film.
This trip was specifically tailored to photography. Challenges involved keeping camera gear dry, clean and powered on a raft trip through 10 days of water, wind and sand. Adam Schallau, our excellent group leader, had done the trip several times before and provided notes of his experiences and recommendations. But naturally one had to balance a wish list against strict weight limits and economic reality.
What worked: keeping camera gear dry (and as free of sand as possible) is hard. There are a lot of inexpensive dry bags and boxes on sale. Don't buy them. I used a Watershed Colorado dry bag for my primary gear and a Pelican Box for my 'on board' boat camera. Both a bit pricey but worth every penny.
I brought more than enough SD cards and batteries, as it turns out. I wasn't sure how quickly my mirrorless Fuji cameras would chew through batteries. The batteries lasted longer than I expected, perhaps due to my conservative 'film school' shooting style. I also brought a couple of Anker power banks and a small USB battery charger. These turned out to be very helpful and effective, to the point where I could have brought fewer batteries. Not camera gear, per se, but extremely useful, was a simple head lamp and extra batteries. The headlamp got used constantly around camp but also on nighttime photo hikes.
Clothing is more of personal choice, but once again one is forced to carefully balance comfort against limits. This is not a trivial thing on a late spring raft trip, as the weather can and will vary tremendously. As a example, we started in snow (in Flagstaff) and ended in 90 degree sun at Diamond Creek. It turns out a couple of water-friendly pairs of shorts and a handful of long-sleeve T's can take you a long way. It was the cool weather gear that was more of a challenge. I was lucky to have included a well-used Patagonia fleece that I almost constantly for the first 2 or 3 days of the trip. And some lightweight long underwear was a surprise winner as well.
One simple $3 item that turned out to be useful and popular was a small whisk broom for sweeping away the ever present sand. Another lucky addition: an extra pair of tough water-friendly hiking sandals, which were pressed into use when I blew out my water shoes on a rocky hike. Things I didn't need: my extra travel tripod never got taken out of the bag. And despite the sand and wind, I was careful enough that I never needed that sensor cleaning kit that I bought at the last minute. A couple of things to bring next time: several larger and stronger carabiners for attaching gear to the raft. Small, cheap ones don't work. Also- a longer lens. Most of my shooting was done with wide to normal lenses, but there were a couple of spots where a long lens would have been very useful.
Anyone doing a trip like this also needs to pack patience and a cooperative spirit. A couple dozen photographers of different ages and sizes will have varying physical abilities. A 10-day raft trip down the Colorado is physically challenging, and there were numerous times when we had to help each other out. And there may be disappointments as well, as a couple of locations we had hoped to visit turned out to be inaccessible for a variety of reasons. But that's just another good reason to go back and do it again!
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