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That afternoon, the weather on the Lava Falls Route was calm and clear, the temperature in the high 80s. Nevertheless, my progress on the descent was agonizingly slow.

The trail was steeper and far more difficult than I expected. Numerous times, I was unable to proceed while wearing my pack. I had to lower it ahead of me on a rope.

Within half an hour, I began to feel flushed. I was concerned, but pressed on.

Soon after, I realized I was becoming light-headed. My vision and concentration were affected. I stopped to consider this ominous turn of events.

There I was, weak, dizzy, nauseated, drenched with sweat, and becoming more so by the minute.

With ears buzzing and colored spots swimming around my field of vision, I concluded that the food poisoning had lowered my reserve strength, and the exertion of the hike finally used up the last of it.

Only two or three times in my long career on the trail have I abandoned a hike and headed home. This was one of those times. It would be folly to keep going.

So, less than a third of the way to the river, I turned around and began the long climb out.

My pace was snail-like, and it got slower as I grew dizzier and more feverish. I would take a few steps, pause to rest, and take a few more. I wore my pack when I could, dragged it behind me on a rope when necessary.

Eventually, I became quite delirious and lost track of time. My memory of the next several hours is spotty.

I remember concluding that in my condition, the pack was too heavy. So I unloaded much of the contents — stove, fuel, food, rain gear, camera — and abandoned it beside the trail.

I remember stopping in the shade of a large boulder to rest and nearly falling asleep. I shook myself awake and, with great effort, kept going.

After an eternity, I reached another large rock and another patch of shade. I paused again to rest.

I remember thinking that I had a simple choice. I could either find the strength to keep going, or I could sit down beside the trail and never get up again.

Essentially on auto-pilot, I continued to drag myself slowly upward, sometimes standing, sometimes crawling.

I was beyond drained when, just before dark, I reached the rim of the canyon at last.

To this day, I am amazed that I succeeded.

Spent and light-headed, I set up my tent and prepared a quick supper of freeze-dried eggs.

As daylight faded, I realized I was still wearing my sunglasses. I reached for the plastic eyeglass case clipped to my pack, which held my prescription glasses.

The case wasn’t there. It had been scraped off as I roped my pack up behind me.

The freeze-dried eggs did not stay down. I threw up with enthusiasm, sailed the rest of the eggs into the undergrowth, fell into my tent, and slept the sleep of the dead.

I awoke at first light, donned my sunglasses, drank some water, and prepared a bit  of breakfast, which I deposited promptly on the ground.

Despite that, I was rested and stronger than the day before. And I already knew what I had to do.

First, I needed to retrieve my abandoned possessions on the trail below. Had I really been so desperate and delirious that I jettisoned my gear, including a thousand-dollar Nikon camera? Yes, I had.

Second, I had food and water, but the prospect of waiting 18 hours for Terry to return had zero appeal. The only solution was to walk the eight miles to the Ranger Station and call Terry.

My foray back down the Lava Falls Route took less than an hour. I was greatly relieved to find my eyeglasses case within 30 feet of the abandoned gear. The case was intact, but the sharp lava rock had left deep scratches in the plastic, as if it had been clawed by a grizzly.

I was shocked when I saw the two large boulders that, in my delirium the day before, seemed so far apart. The distance between them was about 10 feet.

By 8:00 AM, I was back at the rim, exhausted anew and more than a little queasy again. I rested in the tent for 20 minutes until the nausea subsided, then set out for the Ranger Station. I needed to make progress before the sun got higher.

The walk was as grueling as you might imagine. Luckily, two miles from the ranger station, a pickup truck came along and gave me a lift. Weak and exhausted, I banged on the door of the Ranger’s residence.

The Ranger’s wife opened the door. Her husband was away, but she sat me down, got me a glass of ice water, and listened to my story.

She told me that the only telephone service at Toroweap was the Park’s emergency phone. But the line was strictly for dire emergencies, and my situation really didn’t qualify. She said the dispatcher would not be pleased if I called.

I was in no mood for technicalities. I lifted the received and was automatically connected. “Dispatch. What is your emergency?”

I told her my sad story and gave her Terry’s phone number.

“Sir, that is not an emergency. You are tying up this line and possibly blocking a legitimate emergency call.”

I wanted to reach through the line and slap her.

“I know that,” I said, “But I’m stranded out here and deathly ill. If you don’t call my ride, you WILL have an emergency. Please, just call the number.”

The dispatcher put me on hold briefly, then agreed to make the call. We hung up. The truly desperate were free to make their calls.

At about 1:00 PM, Terry arrived in a cloud of dust. He said the dispatcher gave no details, only that I had placed an emergency call, so he came quickly. By 3:00 PM, he had returned me to the motel in Fredonia.

By 4:30 PM, I was sitting in Nedra’s Café, the best Mexican restaurant on the Arizona Strip, with hopes of holding down a meal for the first time in days.

I succeeded. Nedra’s combination plate bolstered me immensely. Maybe by the next day, I thought, normalcy will return.

Normal was a nice thought, but it didn’t happen. I was rested and much better the next day, but still weak.

This was getting out of hand. I had been sick for days and wasn’t pulling out of it. How tainted was that slice of pizza, anyway?

With the Schmutz Spring work project still looming, I decided to go to the hospital in St. George, Utah, 90 minutes away.

The emergency room doctor did blood work, an EKG, and other tests. All my vitals and levels were right on.

I came to see him, he said, one day too soon. He told me to take a vacation for two days. No hiking, nothing strenuous. After that, I would be fine.

The next morning, I called Grand Canyon Field Institute and dropped out of the work project. Soon after, I was on the road north into Utah.

For the next week, I traveled to new territory — Calf Creek Falls, the petrified forest in Escalante, Capitol Reef National Park. As the ER doc predicted, I was soon back to normal and able to resume hiking without restriction or consequence.

I went to Moab, Arches National Park, Canyonlands, Newspaper Rock, and the ruins at Hovenweep. When it was time to head home, I drove south to Four Corners, past Shiprock, through Gallup, and on to Zuni Pueblo.

By the time I reached Albuquerque, the bloom was off my vacation rose. I was mentally back in the real world and resigned to going home.

That ill-fated trip handed me one final indignity before I got home: every single mile of Interstate 40 in Arkansas was under construction. The project was so vast, they were handing out brochures about it at the welcome centers. It was the most unpleasant 300 miles I ever experienced in a car.

When I got back to Georgia, I shared the story of my adventures and misadventures with the family.

My son Dustin said, “Dad, You need to promise you won’t go back to Lava Falls without one of us along.”

I promised.

Who knew a slice of pizza could have such consequences?

Last photo taken on the hike down.

Lava Falls, the elusive goal. Photo from a 2007 raft trip.

Note to self: eschew heat-lamp pizza.

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I should have suspected my trip to Arizona was snakebit when I got food poisoning from a slice of heat-lamp pizza.

I should have known the trip was doomed when I stopped to pick up a rental truck, and the fellow who promised it to me had left the country.

Oh — and this trip was in September 2001, mere weeks after the 9/11 attacks. Air traffic nationwide was grounded. I lost a big chunk of vacation time to the long drive from Georgia to Arizona and back.

On paper, my vacation had great promise. I had signed up for a work project with the Grand Canyon Field Institute. Our group was going to Schmutz Spring, a natural spring near the Toroweap Overlook on the north rim of Grand Canyon. The spring had been stomped into mush by cattle and needed restoration.

It was my second trip to western Grand Canyon. The year before, I had gone to Toroweap with another Field Institute group, and I liked it. I wanted to explore further.

Specifically, I intended to hike down the infamous Toroweap Trail, which leads to Lava Falls, the biggest rapid on the Colorado River. I planned to camp there for two nights and return home with awesome photos.

Twice, I had been through mighty Lava Falls by raft. Hiking down to the rapid and camping there would be a new adventure.

The previous year, our Field Institute group had a chance to hike down to the river. The group leaders called for a vote, but not enough people wanted to go. I was seriously miffed.

So the real highlight of this 2001 trip was the week prior to the restoration project: my long-awaited hike down the Lava Falls Route.

Author and photographer John Annerino, who wrote the definitive Sierra Club handbook, “Hiking the Grand Canyon,” described the Lava Falls Route this way:

Plummeting an astonishing 2,600 vertical feet in a mile and a half, the Toroweap Trail is an avalanche of a route waiting to throw you to your knees during the descent and to suck the last drop of moisture out of you during the debilitating crawl out.

There is little more to say about the viper-plagued route snaking its way through glass-black lava other than follow the rock cairns on the descent and, once you turn around, the white crosses shining the way back out of this fearsome hole.

How could I resist? A mile and a half? That’s a stroll to the mailbox.

On the other hand, getting to the trailhead on the north rim of Grand Canyon is a serious challenge. The trail begins near the Toroweap Overlook — 75 rugged, unpaved miles from Fredonia, the nearest town. To drive your own car to Toroweap would be foolhardy; to drive a rental car, probably illegal.

But I had a plan. On my previous trip, I had met a mechanic in Fredonia, Tony, who offered to let me use (rent) his truck on some future visit. The truck, fitted with heavy-duty tires and three spares, routinely made the run out to Toroweap to rescue stranded motorists.

A few months earlier, I called and told him about my upcoming trip. He readily agreed to let me rent his truck.

At that point, I had a vehicle, a Backcountry Permit, and my gear at the ready. Things were falling into place.

The unraveling of everything began on September 18. After the long drive west, I stopped briefly at Grand Canyon Lodge on the North Rim. At the cafeteria, I ate a slice of pepperoni pizza for lunch before heading to Fredonia.

On the road a short time later, food poisoning kicked in. I pulled over, staggered away from the car, and vigorously deposited the offending pizza at the edge of a roadside meadow.

I reached Fredonia a few hours later, still queasy, and checked into my motel. I went to bed early, hoping to sleep it off.

A good night’s sleep helped considerably. The next morning, feeling almost normal again, I went to Tony’s garage to get the rental truck.

The garage was padlocked. According to a hand-written note in the window, Tony had gone hunting in Canada.

Tony, Tony, Tony.

I was screwed. I couldn’t drive the long, rough road to Toroweap in my own car. All it had was one laughable donut spare tire. Unless I could find other transportation, somewhere, somehow, my Lava Falls hike was off.

With nothing specific in mind, I drove a few miles north to Kanab, Utah, a larger town that might offer options.

When I got to town, I stopped at a camera store to buy a few lens cloths. I told the owner, Terry, about my plight and asked if he knew anyone who might rent me a vehicle.

Terry had a better idea. He would be willing to shuttle me to and from the trailhead for the modest sum of $250.

Ouch. That was about a dollar a mile for two roundtrips, rounded down a bit to be nice.

Well, what choice did I have? I went back to the motel, grabbed my gear, and checked out. Soon, Terry and I were bumping down the road to Toroweap in a Land Cruiser.

Sixty miles south of the nearest pavement sits the Toroweap Ranger Station. Ten miles beyond that, the dirt road ends at the Toroweap Overlook on the rim of Grand Canyon.

To reach the trail to Lava Falls, you turn onto a ridiculously primitive spur road five miles past the Ranger Station. That spur, which is so rough it isn’t even comfortable for walking, ends three miles later at the trailhead.

The trailhead consists of a small bare flat spot close to the rim, a forlorn visitor register, and a beat-up wooden sign where the Lava Falls Route begins.

Terry would be back in two days to pick me up. I was the sole permit-holder. No one else would be there for days.

At that point, my bout of food poisoning was the last thing on my mind. I felt perfectly fine.

Terry helped me unload my gear, which included two extra gallons of water to leave behind at the trailhead, and departed. It was 2:00 PM. I shouldered my pack and headed down the Lava Falls Route at last.

To be continued…

The adventure begins here.

The trailhead.

View from the rim showing the lava flow.

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