The Adventurer's Son(42)
Part III
The southern half of the Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica. The distance between grid lines is six miles. The black star is the site of discovery. N.B. “Los Palmos” on north edge should read “Los Patos.”
Courtesy of the author
Chapter 20
“email, please!”
Paro Takstang Monestary, Bhutan, 2012.
Courtesy of the author
While Roman was exploring the cultures, mountains, and jungles of Central America, I was finishing up home projects and making short day trips and planning a long packrafting trip in the nearby Talkeetna Mountains. I enjoyed hearing about Roman’s trips via email, but looked forward to having him home. When he’d written that he’d been bitten by a dog in Nicaragua and worried it had rabies, I’d even thought to ask him if maybe it was time to come back. But I didn’t.
It had been gratifying to me as his father to see him out on his own. He would return world-wise and confident with a broader view of life. His Spanish would be excellent. His view on economics and the role of the United States in Latin America would be better informed. It was also clear that his adventures had grown naturally from his upbringing: our family trips to Australia, Borneo, Alaska’s wilderness, and elsewhere. I wanted to hear his stories, perspectives, and insights firsthand.
On July 14, home from a Talkeetna Mountains packrafting trip with my friend Gordy Vernon, I scanned Roman’s last email: OK, I found what seems to be the best map yet. Unpacking and catching up, I read no further. But buried in the thread—unseen for another week—was his email that said he was planning on doing 4 days in the jungle and a day to walk out. We’d been emailing about super-secret topo maps of Central America. The two threaded emails seemed part of that conversation. I didn’t read past the best map yet. If I had, then I would have known he planned to be out from his Corcovado trip the very next day.
July 15 was his out-date.
The summer of 2014 was sunny in Anchorage and Peggy and I kept busy. We worked on house projects until peak salmon season, then drove to the Kenai Peninsula to dip-net fish for our freezer. We camped on the beach where the milky-blue Kenai River slides into the glacier-gray Cook Inlet and the sea breeze keeps July’s mosquitoes at bay. Beneath a clear sky and sunshine, we enjoyed the views of mountains rising above fishing boats plowing back to port, their holds full of freshly caught sockeye salmon. The reds were running strong and people lined up shoulder to shoulder, standing in the river, their long-handled nets straining against the current as they excitedly pulled in fish when they felt a gentle bump in their net. We saw friends and filled our coolers with shiny sockeyes.
Still, it nagged at us that we hadn’t yet heard from Roman. I checked my phone for new emails as often as the spotty coverage on the Kenai allowed. Nothing. It had been six months since I’d seen him. He hadn’t told me exactly when he would be back from Latin America, but I hoped to have him home soon. I missed him.
Peggy and I returned from fishing on July 18, cleaned the twenty salmon we’d caught, and set to work finishing a siding project on our house. Days crept by. Still no word. We weren’t alarmed, just a bit surprised. Hardly a fortnight would pass since Veracruz when we wouldn’t hear something from Roman. On July 21—twelve days after he had last written—I sent a gentle reminder: “Let me know when you get out.” His email linked to the one starting with the best map yet sat unread in my inbox.
On July 23, Peggy and I wandered between fasteners and paint at Lowes, wondering aloud to each other why we had heard nothing from Roman. Two weeks had passed. The longest stretch he’d gone without contacting us after Veracruz had been ten days, during his trips across El Petén and La Moskitia. We were worried now.
“I need to look at his last email again,” I told Peggy. “I didn’t really read it carefully and I’m not sure what he wrote. It seems like it was just about maps.”
Then and there in Lowes Home Improvement, Peggy felt nauseous. We left empty-handed to drive straight home and read his emails carefully. I opened the July 9 thread where the words heading in off-trail tomorrow . . . 4 days in the jungle and a day to walk out spilled across my screen. My face went numb.
OH NO! He’s way overdue—fuck!
I should have been paying closer attention!
Shock washed over me. Then guilt. Guilt over the fact that I hadn’t read his email thoroughly, that I hadn’t given him the attention he deserved. That, maybe, like Peggy pointed out in nearly every argument, I spent too much time on my own trips, on my own interests.
“Peggy. This email says he should have been done, like”—I struggled with the arithmetic—“like, ten days ago! Something’s wrong!” I turned to her. Her forehead tightened, cheeks slack. She saw my terror; it increased her own.
WE JUMPED INTO action. She slid me a notebook and pen across the table, then got on the phone and called Jazz. I set to work on the computer, my hands shaking. Fighting panic and rising nausea, I googled Corcovado national park guides, looking for someone to help us.
My Spanish too poor to call, I shot off an email to Osa Corcovado Tours.
My name is Roman Dial and my son, Cody Roman Dial, age 27, is missing in Corcovado National Park. He is about 177 cm tall (5 feet 10 inches), with blue eyes, brown hair and glasses. He weighs about 63 kg (140 lbs). He should have a blue two-person tent.