The Doctor is in…meet Stephen “Doc” Nicholson

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My name is Stephen Nicholson aka “Doc”, due to my education at Southern California School of Dentistry Surgery and occupation, a dentist….My home town is Bayfield Colorado, where I have resided for over 35 years.

My first trip in Grand Canyon was 1974, I ran three trips that summer with a Grand Canyon outfitter and got certified to run river at summer’s end.   This is my 10th season for GCE. Wow, how times fly!  My favorite stops in the grand are many…I’ll try and par them down.  I love Vasey’s Paradise, Redwall, Stone Creek , Tapeats and Deer Creek.

I started going to the Colorado River when I was 8-years old with my family – my dad was the instigator.  In the fall of 1957, when I was 12 years old, I had already seen a bit of Lake Mead. Later that year, two gentlemen came to our Jr. High School, they spoke and showed a movie of them swimming the Grand Canyon!  In the spring on April 10, 1955, Bill Beer and John Daggett had made history by swimming the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon.  They were the only men to float through the Grand Canyon without a boat, they were in “wetsuits” and “water-wings”, twenty-six days and 280 miles later, bruised and battered, they left the river at Pierce Ferry.  It was a true, front page worthy adventure of a lifetime for Beer and Daggett.

Doc, is yet, another eccentric member of our dory crew.  GCE runs two types of expeditions, the 8-day motorized and the 14 & 16 day rowing trips.  The skill of the dory crew is at the oars. Doc is a valued GCE employee and his passion for the river is still obvious and we truly enjoy his stories……Hey, even I didn’t know that the Doc was around when Daggett & Beer swam the river!

reference: We swam the Grand Canyon: The true story of a cheap vacation that got a little out of hand.  Bill Beer (author, editor), John Daggett (Illustrator)….above photo: Rebecca (Becky) Burton, Grand Canyon, Colorado river mile 178, at “Vulcans Anvil”, just above Lava Falls…..

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