Gershwin’s Grand Canyon rescue

Once upon a time, there was a boy named Gershwin. Now, Gershwin was an adventurer. He’d been all over the place. He’d been to Mars. He’d been to the North Pole. He’d been to the jungle. He’d been down deep in a submarine. He’d been to so many places.

He’d even been to Brooklyn, where Spider-Man and Mario lived. But there was somewhere else in America that he’d always wanted to visit. This was the Grand Canyon. He’d never been to the Grand Canyon, but he’d seen loads and loads of pictures and videos of people going there, so it was something he had to do.

He had also heard that a really loud shout could make the rocks shiver.

So he decided he would visit for himself. He packed really good, sturdy shoes, ones made for climbing. He packed gloves. He packed a rope just in case he’d need it, and he put it all in his rucksack, along with his camera, and headed to the airport. Now, the flight was very long. The flight was almost sixteen hours.

With everything packed in his rucksack, he headed to the airport. It wasn’t a long drive. It only took about ten minutes to get to the airport, so the taxi was there in no time. And then he went in. He went through security, got into the lounge, had some food ready for the trip ahead, and very soon he was called to the gate. He took his seat in the aeroplane and settled down for the long flight.

When he was heading into the plane, he checked his ticket, and the number was twenty-seven A, the perfect seat right on the wing, so he could see everything as he was flying along, both behind and in front of the plane. He was inside the plane, next to the wing.

So there was just a window in between him and the wing.

Very soon, one of the air hostesses came up to him and said, “I’m sorry, Mr Gershwin. I believe you’re in the wrong seat.”

Gershwin said, “No, this is my seat on the wing, right here. It says. Look, see.”

“Ah, I see the confusion,” said the air hostess. “You’re on our special adventurer seat. That’s twenty-seven capital A. You’re in seat twenty-seven lowercase A. If you’d just like to come this way, I’ll take you to your seat.”

Gershwin didn’t know what was happening, so he followed the air hostess anyway. Very soon, she opened the door and stepped out onto the wing of the plane. Gershwin was baffled, but then she walked over, pulled up a little hatch in the plane, and a seat popped out.

She said, “If you’d like to sit there, we’ll be on our way.”

So Gershwin sat down as he was told. The air hostess strapped him in very tight, with four-point harnesses over his shoulder, around his waist, and some extra ones on his legs, just to be sure. Gershwin found this very interesting, and he was very excited for the plane to take off. It really ignited his adventurous spirit.

Very soon, the plane was moving, going down the runway, getting faster and faster. Gershwin’s hair got ruffled up in the wind. His cheeks got puffed up.

So the plane took off and got up into the air. Very soon the air hostess sent him a message on the little radio she’d given him, saying, “It’s okay for you to walk around now if you want.”

Gershwin was confused. Walk around? And then he saw two big pairs of boots in front of him. They were huge. They looked just like space boots.

The air hostess pointed to the boots and said, “You can just sit in those, and then you can walk around.”

So that’s what Gershwin did. He put the boots on. They clamped into his legs, and he realised these were special magnetic boots. When he lifted one foot off the plane wing, it disconnected the magnet, and he could move his foot. The other one held on strong, and this meant he could walk around the wing as much as he liked.

So he did. He looked around. He walked around. He looked over the edge of the wing. He waved at the people below, even though they couldn’t see him because they were too far away.

But after a while, he got bored, so he settled back to his seat. He felt a bit tired, so he tried to find a way to recline his seat. He felt around and eventually pressed a button on the back of the seat. This didn’t exactly do what he wanted.

The seat shot forward to the edge of the wing, and before he knew it, Gershwin was dangling off the wing. It was quite frightening. He was looking down, straight down, but the seat was holding him in place. After a while, he realised that it was quite fun being able to see everything below him, but he still wanted to relax.

So he pressed the button again, and the seat went back. He pressed around a bit more and eventually found the relaxation button, which lowered the seat down into a flat, bed-like position. Even though he was very high up, moving very fast, and there was lots of wind, he fell fast asleep very quickly.

His radio suddenly went off. “Gershwin, this is your stop.”

Gershwin woke up and looked around, and he was still very high in the air.

“What do you mean, [unclear words]?”

“You are going to the Grand Canyon,” said the air hostess. “The Grand Canyon is right below us. Put the rucksack on, and just press the button when you’re ready to go.”

Gershwin put his rucksack on, looked around, pressed the button, and all of a sudden a parachute opened. He was sucked off the plane by the parachute and gently floated all the way down to Earth, and landed at the viewing point for the Grand Canyon.

That was an interesting flight, he thought. But now it’s time to explore the Grand Canyon.

He got rid of his parachute and just had his rucksack left, with all of his things in it. He grabbed the rope, tied it to the viewing platform, tied it to his waist, and jumped over the side. Feet landing on the Grand Canyon below, he abseiled his way down to the bottom. Quick, quick, quick! Bounce, bounce, bounce!

It was a long way down, but he made it very quickly. And there he was, inside the Grand Canyon. Beautiful orange rocks that he’d seen in photos and videos surrounded him. Lots of tiny little places to crawl through. Lots of big, big hills to climb up. So he went to explore.

He explored around for almost the whole day, climbing through crevices, jumping over big puddles that had settled over the weeks where there’d been no rain. Eventually, he reached the point that he’d been waiting for. This was Command Point One, and it was the highest point in the Grand Canyon, and this was what he wanted to climb up.

So he made sure his shoes were tied tight, put on his climbing gloves and started to climb.

Up, up, up. He climbed all the way. On his way up, he saw lots of interesting things. There was a mountain goat that was confused by the fact he was there. It just gave him a funny look and then scampered off. He saw a beautiful bald eagle flying past. An absolutely gorgeous bird it was. It squawked at him and then left him alone.

And then, before he knew it, he’d reached the top of the Grand Canyon. It was a spectacular view. He could see miles and miles and miles around him, all of the Grand Canyon just sprawling out before him.

Then, in the distance, he saw a rain cloud. Now, he’d heard about the fact that there were flash floods in the Grand Canyon, and if there was rain, it could fill up the Grand Canyon in a matter of minutes. So he thought he’d better start heading back. He saw lightning in the distance. He heard the rumble of thunder, and he could see the rain coming down from the clouds.

By the time he climbed down from Command Point One, there was water in the canyon below him. So he splashed through the puddles on his way back to the viewing point. Splash, splash, splash! And then there it was: a flash flood coming straight towards him. Just this massive torrent of water coming through the Grand Canyon.

He still had his [unclear words].

The flash flood was so big, he thought he’d better get out of its way. This wasn’t just a little flood. This wasn’t up to his ankles or his knees or his waist. This was so high it was all the way up to his nose, and he definitely couldn’t survive being under that water. So he quickly climbed up into a crevice in the rock, slightly further up. There were lots of other animals sheltering in there.

Inside there, there was a snake and a scorpion, but they looked scared of the water. Now, Gershwin was able to talk to animals. We knew that, and he said, “Don’t worry, animals. I’ll make sure you’re okay.”

“Thank you,” said the animals together.

Gershwin went through his rucksack and found his inflatable walls. He had two of them, which was just right for the place he was, and he very quickly inflated them. He put one on one side of the crevice and one on the other side, and he could hear the water splashing up against it. But inside the crevice, everything stayed nice and dry.

Very soon, the water had died down a little. Gershwin turned to the snake and the scorpion and said, “Jump into my rucksack, and I’ll take you to the top of the mountain, where you’ll be nice and safe.”

They jumped in. Gershwin went out and started to climb. They would be safe from the water up there.

He realised he was only a few metres away from the viewing point, which was good because that was his pick-up point for the helicopter. So he climbed up, reached over the top, opened his bag and let the snake and the scorpion out.

“Thank you very much,” they said as they slithered and crawled away.

Gershwin gave them a wave, happy that he’d been able to help those two animals.

As he looked out from the viewing point, he could see that there were plenty of animals out there still worried about the flood. There were goats and rats and mice, and they were all nervous and scared. So when the helicopter landed next to him, Gershwin knew just what he had to do.

“Guys, there’s no time to take me anywhere just yet. We’ve got to save all of these animals. They’re in danger from the water. So, if you can get me there, we can save them.”

And the helicopter did, because it was there to help Gershwin in whatever way he needed. The helicopter took off, and Gershwin stood on the edge of the helicopter. The helicopter flew around to where all the animals were, and Gershwin attached his rope and gently lowered himself down.

The helicopter had a little sling, and he put the animals into the sling. Then he moved on to the next crevice, did the same there, and the next, until he’d rescued every animal that he could see.

When he got back on the viewing point, it was like being in a zoo. There were over a hundred animals that he’d rescued, and they were all saying thank you and nuzzling against him. But Gershwin couldn’t hang around now because his flight would be leaving soon. So the helicopter quickly took him to the airport. Gershwin attached himself to the wing again, and they took off and headed back.

As the plane took off, he looked down at the Grand Canyon, where, before he’d left, he’d fitted every single barrier that he had in his rucksack, blown them all up, and put them at the top of all of the mountains to stop the water from getting out. Every animal would be nice and safe. And the water would be kept in the Grand Canyon until it dried up, which would only take a couple of days.

Gershwin knew he’d done a good job, but he was tired, so he fell asleep in his wing seat. Very soon, he’d arrived home. And obviously, they didn’t land near his house. He just jumped off the wing and parachuted back down. He landed in his back garden, opened the door and sat down in his daddy’s office.

He rolled up his parachute, nice and tight, in a big tight ball, wrapped some string around it, attached a magnet, and threw it very, very, very strongly. It flew up through the sky, found the plane, and the magnet clipped itself to the wing. So the parachute was going back with the plane to whoever needed it next.

Gershwin took out his camera, which he’d managed to take some photos on, and printed out all of the photos to put in his junk journal, so he’d always remember that day. And that was the day he went to the Grand Canyon.

He would have to go back another day to try making the rocks shiver with a shout.

The end.