Flash flood was quite a rush

A washout added a bit of adventure to this day.
CAPITOL REEF NATIONAL PARK, Utah -- Those of us who live in the East don't really have a concept of flash flooding. We know all about floods, to be sure, but flash flooding as it happens in the West is a whole different problem.
On a recent vacation to Arizona and Utah, we kept seeing signs that referred to flash flooding: "Do not enter canyon during a rainstorm." And, "If thunderstorms threaten, stay out of this area."
We didn't understand what all the fuss was about. Sure, it rained a bit, and there was a thunderstorm to the west of us one day, but all the creek beds and rivers in our area were dry, and looked like they'd been that way all summer.
Driving into Capitol Reef National Park we saw more of those signs. We also crossed seven steeply sided concrete gullies set into the blacktop road. But the sun was shining, the creek beds were bone dry, and we weren't worried.
We left the blacktop for a four-mile dirt road that took us to the head of Capitol Canyon. From there we hiked about a mile into the canyon, enjoying the scenery, the petroglyphs, the whimsical rock cairns, and the hidden water tanks. On our way back we passed two British girls, a group of three, and an older couple.
Ranger's warning
About halfway to the car we met a park ranger.
"I need you to go back to your car immediately and drive up to the paved road," he said without preamble. "Wait for me there. There's been a flash flood, and you can't get out. How many people are behind you?"
Seven, we told him, wondering just how serious this could be. The sun was still shining.
"Don't try to get out by yourselves," he insisted. "Wait for me at the paved road." Then he double-timed into the canyon, talking on his radio as he went.
We did our own double-time to the car, then barreled up four miles of dirt road to the pavement. There, seven other vehicles were scattered around a small parking lot. Some of the drivers were talking, so we went over to them.
"Were you told to wait here, too?" we asked.
"Didn't you hear the siren?" they said. "The road is flooded and we can't get out."
The group
Most of the people were Americans, but there were several British groups and one German couple. We Americans turned the day into high adventure. We swapped vacation stories, made jokes about the beef jerky and trail mix we'd probably be having for supper, and wondered how many of us could fit into the single motor home there. A man from Illinois offered his light beer to the highest bidder, wondering if he could pay for his vacation that way.
The Germans paced and frowned and didn't say much. The Brits stayed in their cars, hunched worriedly over the steering wheels. It started to rain, so we pulled up our hoods and kept laughing. It was Sept. 11.
The ranger appeared in about 45 minutes, leading three other cars. He closed the road behind us, locking a gate with a no-nonsense padlock.
Getting out
"We're going to form a convoy," he said, "out to the first gully. A road grader will meet us there."
Moving out in good order, we lined up at the first gully, which was a foot deep in boiling red mud, water, tree branches and rocks. A grader eventually appeared on the far side and scraped the gully out, then we drove down into and up out of the rushing water to the other side. The grader preceded us through each gully, then roared off home and left us at the seventh, where a new group of rangers waited on the far side.
"You can't drive through this one," they radioed, "the water's too fast. We'll have to wait for it to go down." One ranger picked up the heaviest rock he could handle and threw it into the flood. It bounced across the road like a ping pong ball and disappeared beneath the roiling mass of muddy red water on the other side. On our side, our ranger told stories of unlucky tourists who had braved the flood waters, then had to jump out of their overturning vehicles as they were swept away.
We waited.
From the time we saw the first ranger until we finally drove out of the park, it was about four hours. No one was hurt, and our sturdy little rental car didn't collect a single scrape. No one even got hungry, thanks to the trail mix. We were less worried than amused by the whole adventure, and we gained a new respect for the work of park rangers. We also thought it was a pretty good way for Americans to mark Sept. 11, by going about our lives and working through our problems with a healthy attitude and a little humor.