Posts Tagged “grand canyon”

Not much to report today along the lines of travel. We drove to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and back. I’m still feeling a little woozy from the altitude, but I think we should be heading closer to sea level soon. I looked up Washington D.C.’s elevation last night: 410 ft. above sea level. No wonder it’s giving us such problems! The Grand Canyon is close to 9,000 ft! It’s even higher at some spots. Sheesh.

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We were pretty worried when we left today because it was really, really cold! Plus it was cloudy, and it rained on our drive up from Flagstaff to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. Eek! In fact, it was so cloudy today — and the elevation here is so high — that by the time we got to Mather’s Point on the South Rim, we were actually standing in a cloud.

Just to show you how hardcore the Grand Canyon is, check this out:

Note the uneven rocks under Brian’s feet and also the janky handrail! There is a sign, and I am not kidding about this, that actually says that “most” of the people who die at the Grand Canyon walk off the path or trail. Most?!

I promise you that there is, in fact, a whole Grand Canyon out there, but it’s awfully hard to see! It was actually pretty cool, though. I don’t know how many people have gotten to stand in a cloud overlooking the Grand Canyon. Anyway, we walked down to the visitor center (there’s kind of a parking situation at the South Rim… much more populated than the North Rim and completely inadequate parking, and the enormous “information complex” is pretty far from the parking lot), and by the time we got back to the viewpoint, the fog had lifted quite a bit. Still cold though!

We decided that since it was so cold, today wasn’t a good day to try to do much in the way of walking trails. Instead, we just drove toward Desert View, stopping at a few overlooks along the way. We saw our only wildlife of the day at one of them:

This is Grandview Point:

We ended our Grand Canyon journey at Desert View, where you can see (and climb) the historic watchtower:

and see all this:

Despite the crowds (even at this time of year — I cannot imagine what a nightmare it is in summer) and the cold and wind, I loved the Grand Canyon. Next time I come, I want to take a mule down to the bottom of the canyon. Brian wants to go whitewater rafting.

We’re now back in our Motel 6 in Flagstaff. Tomorrow we move along!

Today we drove down to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Amazing. As beautiful as it is here, I’m kind of eager to move on to a location that is lower than 9000 feet above sea level. My lungs haven’t really adjusted well to the altitude. I wouldn’t say that breathing is hard… but it’s not super easy either. Oh, and as awe-inspiring as the Grand Canyon is, it’s equally terrifying. Most walkways have no barriers and the drops are steep and (obviously) long. While many other visitors were using this freedom to climb out onto every ledge they could find, Isabel and I were just trying to stop our knees from shaking.

The North Rim is represented by the “B” on the map. That craggy area in the center of the map is the Grand Canyon. It looks much bigger in person. We’re camped out (er, motel-ed out?) in Flagstaff, ready to hit the South Rim tomorrow. Route log is below.

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We left Kanab this morning and soon found ourselves in Arizona!

Same sign here as at the Nevada border.

We stopped in at the welcome center in Fredonia, Ariz., and got some really helpful information from the guy working there. He gave us some suggestions of place to eat; for example, he said, “Oh, if you haven’t had breakfast yet, you have to stop here to eat,” while pointing to Jacob Lake, Ariz., on the map. When I asked him the name of the restaurant, though, he looked at me like I was nuts. I soon understood what that was about — we drove through countless tiny towns in northern Arizona today that consisted of a single small complex with a gas station, a restaurant, a motel, and a gift shop (usually all in one building). But at the time, I thought it was weird. Anyway, he also gave us some great route and stops suggestions, so we were excited to get going! This welcome center also featured cats!!

We drove down Rt. 89 through some very pretty desert, then we stopped in Jacob Lake for a very nice meal before heading into the Kaibab Forest where the aspens have already turned yellow:

Then we headed into the North Rim of the Grand Canyon!! Shortly after we entered the park, we saw some wild turkeys (we’ve seen a few others in our travels, but they’re so speedy that I usually can’t catch them with the camera):

Now, apparently the North Rim doesn’t get nearly the tourism that the South Rim gets, and it doesn’t have as much in the way of services, visitor centers, etc. But it does have a couple of (relatively) easy trails with truly amazing views. First we went on the trail to Bright Angel Point (near the North Rim Visitor Center). It was actually pretty crazy with semi-steep hills and some scary parts where there really wasn’t much between our path and the 8,000-foot drop below. Yikes!

What you can’t see in that photo is how tightly I’m gripping the handrail. I don’t really think of myself as having too much fear of heights, but I have been surprisingly uncomfortable in a lot of these rustic (for me!) trails in high places. Eek!

This area was really beautiful, but the immensity is difficult to convey in a photograph. We had a kind of hazy afternoon today, too, which makes it hard to see!

Then we drove down the other part of the North Rim to go toward Cape Royal. On the way there, we saw a mule deer!

We also stopped at Roosevelt Point, where we read this:

Leave it as it is. You can not improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it. What you can do is to keep it for your children, your children’s children, and for all who come after you, as one of the great sights which every American if he can travel at all should see. –- President Theodore Roosevelt, speaking about the Grand Canyon at a speech there on May 6, 1903

I agree!

Here are some of the awesome things we saw on the Cape Royal trail. This is Angel’s Window:

It was formed by erosion and you can walk on top of it (if you look closely, you can see a railing and some people up there), which we did so we could see this:

You can see the Colorado River in the photo above snaking through the canyon; here’s a closer look:

At Cape Royal itself, you can see another beautiful view:

After that, we finally tore ourselves away and drove back up to Jacob Lake (the only way out from the North Rim) and headed down towards our home for the night, Flagstaff, Ariz. On the way, we stopped at the Navajo Bridge. It’s a pedestrian bridge (next to a vehicle bridge) over the Colorado River above Marble Canyon at the edge of the Navajo Indian Reservation.

It’s over 460 feet down!

After all the heights-scaling today, I only made it one way across the bridge. Brian had to walk back across by himself, cross the vehicle bridge in Pearl (which we had to do anyway), and come pick me up on the other side. Here they are coming to get me!

Haha. In retrospect, the bridge wasn’t all that scary, but I think I had just reached my heights quota for the day or something. I don’t think I’ve mentioned this before, but because of the time of year, there are still a lot of tourists around the parks and the like, but many of them are retirees (unlike peak tourist season in the summer, when I think it’s usually families and younger people). A bunch of retirees today were totally making fun of me for my wussy-ness with regards to trails at the Grand Canyon (I did make it to the ends of the trails, but sometimes I was too scared to move from my spot at the center of platforms out to the edge of the railings). They kept saying how I was a lot younger than they were, and they were doing it. They really would have scoffed to see me wimp out on the Navajo Bridge!!

Anyway, we had a lovely dinner at the historic Cameron Trading Post in Cameron, Ariz. (another one-building town recommended to us by the guy at the welcome center this morning), and now we’re all settled in at the luxurious Motel 6 directly adjacent to the railroad tracks in Flagstaff, Ariz. Tomorrow, we’re going to the other side of the Grand Canyon!