Happy Labor Day from the Grand Canyon

Monday, 9/3

Today we drove to the Grand Canyon....after our last hot shower and West Wing in bed (our tv swivels so that it can be watched in the "living room" as well as in the bedroom) because we woke up SO early (around 5am), we were on our way.  Our trusty truck pulled the RV easily to an elevation of 8840 feet above sea level (according to the roadside signs).  We decided to try our luck finding a campsite on the the north rim--shorter drive and far fewer people, we heard--and drove up hopefully at 9:30am to the National Park Service info booth at the only camping ground on the north rim.  We arrived at JUST the right time---someone had just cancelled a day of their reservation, and it was the only site available, and it was big enough for our rig.  Wunderbar!  By 10am we were set up and ready to begin our hike for the day.  We drove about 20 mins to the trailhead of the Kaibab Trail which actually goes all the way down to the bottom of the Canyon to a bridge that crosses the Colorado River and to (you guessed it) another trail that ascends all the way up to the top of the South Rim.  What I've just described is a two-day undertaking, involving spending the night at the Phantom Ranch deep in the Canyon.  Which involves making expensive reservations about 9 months ago.  Which we had not done.  So instead: we hiked down the trail for about 45 minutes (a drop of about 1000 feet in elevation) on a nice sandy trail with the numerous requisite switchbacks.  Oh, and many piles of mule "muffins" (the less hardy non-hikers ride mules up and down the trails).  There were a LOT of mule muffins, let's just put it that way.

At a lookout point along our downhill climb into the canyon

This picture doesn't do it justice...it's 10 miles across!

Some of the "Canyon Furniture"

The views from this part of the this particular trail are not the most spectacular in the whole canyon, but that was fine by me.  We also had about 80% fewer tourists to share it with (they were on the other side, 10 miles away, all jostling for position at the roadside lookout points, no doubt).  I wholeheartedly agree with Edward Abbey, who is quoted on the back of our Official Guide to Hiking the Grand Canyon (thanks Jeff and Shannon!) as saying,

"I find that in contemplating the natural world my pleasure is greater if there are not too many others contemplating it with me at the same time."

Amen to THAT sentiment.

The Grand Canyon is basically indescribable (but of course I'll give it a shot anyway).    It takes up the whole horizon and then some, as far as you can see in many directions.  VAST is a word that comes to mind. Very architectural looking and majestic and awe-inspiring and just unbelievably gigantic.  It looks as though humans might have had a hand in constructing it but then you realize it's on way too large a scale.  You just have to look and look and look at it until your eyes are re-calibrated to the immensity of it all.   In other words, you have to see it in person to really see it.  (Sorry about that, all of you who are not free right now to travel to Arizona).

We came home and ate a big supper (we were famished after all that climbing up and down).  At sunset we walked out past the tent sites to the canyon rim edge for more great views.  We had the whole thing pretty much to ourselves.

GC at sunset

All the high altitude exertion makes for really tired hikers.  Nils was asleep by around 7:15pm!   I stayed up to read until a slightly more adult hour.  And then, to bed.