True places. Real people. An extraordinary journey.
The True Story of Sixteen Men and the First Descent of Mexico's Deadliest Canyon
El Sumidero Canyon. Sixteen miles of limestone, carved over eight million years. The Río Grijalva has killed men since the first recorded attempt in 1527. No expedition had ever successfully run the river.
Explore the StorySome places don't forgive mistakes.
December 1962. Jack Currey, twenty-nine, brings sixteen men to the river's edge. Three army-surplus rafts. Six sets of oars. No roads out.
By the end of the second day, one man is bleeding alone on a ledge across an unswimmable river. The leader is stranded with his cameraman on a different ledge. What happens over the ensuing days is inconceivable.
It's not just an adventure story. It's a story about what happens when ordinary men face an extraordinary challenge.
The Book
Coming early 2027 on Amazon
Grit Knows No Limits is the true story of one of the twentieth century's great untold expeditions, and of the men who lived it.
Get an email the day the book is available, plus occasional updates from the author.
About the Author
Dorine Currey Rivers grew up running wild rivers with her father, Jack Currey, founder of Western River Expeditions and leader of the 1962 first descent of Mexico's El Sumidero Canyon, the deadliest and least understood gorge in North America at the time. She knew most of the sixteen men on that expedition personally and has spent years with the survivors and their families, gathering the story that became Grit Knows No Limits.
River, as her friends call her, has spent her career developing EdTech companies designed to help people learn faster and remember more. She is the founder of VitaSum, a longevity and wellness platform. She also created SKILZ, a program designed to help teenagers launch into adulthood more fully and with greater confidence. She is a graduate of the Hollywood Film Institute and an internationally award-winning screenwriter.
Grit Knows No Limits is her eighth book. Her previous work includes Seasons: One Woman's Journey, a Benjamin Franklin Award finalist; the children's book The Checkered War, an N.N. Light Book Awards finalist written under the pen name Aunt Haggis; and the business books Brain to Bank, which won first place in the Indie Book Awards, and Working Together Alone. She is also working on the first English translation of Vicente Pineda's 1888 history of the Chiapanec uprisings, the same world of Chiapas and its people that shaped Grit Knows No Limits.
She lives in Arizona, where she is, as always, writing the next one.