The Grand Canyon

Up at 4:15 to get ready for the epic hike.  At 5am, just before we left our room, the alarm clock in the room went off. Yikes!  It's a good thing we had gotten up early because if we were planning to sleep in it would have been a real bummer for the alarm to go off unplanned at 5 in the morning!!!  

It's difficult to park over near the Bright Angel trailhead, but we took our chances and drove over since the shuttle bus doesn't start until later in the morning (meaning 5:45am)   :-) 

We started down the trail in the pitch black with the use of our headlamps. There were a surprising number of other folks doing the same thing, so as you looked up and down the trail you could see a drawn out string of lights bobbing along. Very shortly after we started we were passed by a couple that were running down the trail. It turns out that they were going rim to rim to rim, meaning across to the North Rim and then all the way back (a 42 mile trek).  Suddenly it made our crazy hike seem almost sane!

It was pretty incredible to have the canyon gradually take shape around us with the dawn. The first part of the hike takes you down between massive rock faces and although we couldn't see them, we could tell they were there because of the quality of our voice echoing. If we shined our headlamps up on them, we could barely make them out--or at least see that our light was landing on something solid. 

After the second rest stop (did I mention that I absolutely LOVE composting toilets?) we apparently reached the "fun" part of the trail.  First we saw a dude hiking in full Batman costume. When I took his picture, he gave us his email and asked us to send him the picture later.  We also met people coming the other way who would send messages with us to other people further down the trail, such as, "OK, when you pass the guy with the green backpack, tell him he might want to empty out the rocks that I filled up his camp shoes with," etc.   Basically we were having a ball!

The thing that surprised me the most on the trail was how we saw so many lush areas. From the top of the canyon the whole area appears to be so arid, sandy, and dry, but down at the base of even the little side canyons, where the little streams run down, it's an amazing thread of vibrant green. At Indian Gardens there was apparently a native American tribe that farmed there for centuries. It is so picturesque there with big, beautiful shade trees, sprawling meadows, and then of course these massive red and white rock faces rising up on either side. 

We made it down to Indian Gardens in good time. We had been carrying less water to that point because we knew we could refill there for the rest of the hike.  Below that rest stop was my favorite part of the hike--a winding slot canyon with smoother rock than other areas along the hike, and the lush stream in the bottom, the random tree reaching up to where our trail hugged the edge of the cliff, about 20-25 ft above the stream.  Spectacular!!

Below the slot canyon we had a bit more to descend, but much more gently and before we knew it, we were at the river!  I probably would have been more emotional about our arrival if I hadn't suddenly taken notice of the fact that my ankles, calves, and knees were completely shot.  Somehow when you are hiking down you just don't notice for a long while, and so it was pretty much when we stopped at the river that I realized how much pain I was in. It was 9am and we had the whole day hiking ahead of us, going up!  To say that I was worried would be a bit of an understatement but I was relieved to discover that when we started going up, the different set of muscles I needed for that were still fresh and strong. 

From there we hiked along the river for a couple of miles as we had decided to go up on a different trail.  The other trail was supposed to be four miles shorter (which also means a lot steeper!) but we decided that it would be nice to cut the distance, as well as just have a different set of views on the way up. In the end we only save ourselves two miles rather than four, but we were still glad we chose that route.  Plus, the hike along the river was pretty awesome.  When you are down in that lower slot canyon where the river is, you can only see to the top of that little tiny crevasse--it's hard to get any feel for the massive greater canyon. It actually *feels* like you have huge walls rising on either side, but then you come out to a few spots where you can see all the way up to the rim and it is positively breathtaking!

When we got to the bridge we were about 15 minutes past the point at which we had decided our turnaround should be, so we bypassed the side trip to Phantom Ranch. It would have added an extra mile for us, plus we would have started our ascent too late. That was disappointing, as we were hoping to postmark a postcard from there--apparently they carry the mail out by mule, and it's kind of a novel thing to do. Anyway, we headed straight on up to meet the South Kaibab Trail. 

It was pretty grueling, but spectacular. By the time we got to Skeleton Point, which is where you come out of the lower river canyon and onto the plateau, I was literally in tears and not at all sure I was going to be able to make it.

Somehow I was able to put mind over matter and work through it. One way was by just forcing myself to walk normally (rather than hobble) and pretend that I wasn't in pain. Interesting how when you do that, you actually do experience less pain. Important life lesson. The other way was to look at a place up the trail and decide that yes, I was capable of getting at least to there. Maybe not any further, but at least that far. If I couldn't manage either of those approaches, I would resort to just focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. 

We found a completely amazing place to stop for our lunch, at a red rock outlook somewhere above Skeleton Point. It felt delicious to rest, but the pain was fifty times worse when I started again, so I decided against any more long breaks. It was easier to not break the rhythm and momentum. 

Our trail up was along a ridge, as a contrast to the valley we hiked in on the way down. In many places we had sloping cliffs going thousands of feet down on either side of the trail. I didn't feel particularly frightened going up because the trail feels close when you have it directly in front of you, close to your face and hands. However, when I would turn around periodically to take in the view, I was glad we didn't hike down that trail. It seems much more scary with everything dropping away in front of you. 

After many, many, many agonizing steps, we made it to the top. I had started talking to some people at the rim when Jonathan noticed that the shuttle bus had arrived at the parking lot. We were anxious to get back, shower, and find some real food that didn't involve salty nuts or Luna bars, so we were in fact forced to run--yes, that right RUN, to the bus stop. I thought I would collapse and die!  I guess that's the motivation of food...

We somehow climbed the stairs to our room and showered, but the real fun was going back down to catch the shuttle over for dinner. It turns out I simply couldn't go down the steps. At all. Eventually, by hanging into Jonathan with one arm and on the rail with the other, I could sort of hop down, crutches-style, as if I had both of my legs in casts or something. Then,  believe it or not, we had to run to the shuttle bus AGAIN!  

Once on the bus, we realized that we had forgotten the car keys (the car was over near the other trailhead, which is also close to where all the restaurants are). After debating what to do, we decided to just take the bus back to our room after dinner and get the car in the morning. 

Our dinner was great, but we were so tired we could hardly stay upright. We basically went straight to bed when we got back around 8:30, and we slept for 10 hours!