A Grand Adventure - Day 4 (Devil's Tower, North Rim, and Tree puns)

Thursday morning, we woke up, ate breakfast and started out driving toward the north rim.  On the way we decided to stop at Desert View Tower which was more or less on the way.

 The tower itself is pretty cool with a spiral staircase around the inside and a lot of Native American artwork on the walls.

Each level of the tower had viewing windows which you could enjoy great views of the canyon.  

In my opinion, these were some of the best views of not just the canyon, but the Colorado River, too.

Afer snapping some pictures, we bought gas at a nearby station ($2.84/ gallon) and then continued our drive toward the north rim.  The north rim is about 1,200 feet higher than the south rim so we expected our drive would involve climbing some hills.  We were hoping the transmission of the vans would hold up since there was NOTHING around for many miles.  

No roadsigns. No billboards.  No signs of civilization.

 Occasionally on a long incline the vans would pop into a lower gear and engine would whine as the rpms would jump above 3,000, and we'd have to slow down a bit.  I don't think I mentioned that while our camper van was on the newer side (63,000 miles) the Hall's van had 235,000 miles!

We knew we would be driving through a long stretch of Native American land on this drive. Once and awhile there would be a roadside stripmall of sorts crudely pieced together with plywood. 

This was one of the bigger ones.

Inside they would sell various handmade Native American knickknacks or jewelry.  Assuming everything is actually handmade, the workmanship on the things they sell is really beautiful and intricate.  Jen bought an ornament, and I think some others bought some jewelry.  I discovered that they do not barter over the price.  I had a theory that this was an agreement among all of the members of the tribe (I think they are Havasupai) not to undercut each other's prices because they all had almost the exact same prices for the same types of items.  After I saw the types of homes they appeared to live in, I felt bad even asking for less than the price they were asking for.

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Every so often we would drive by a Native American community and the homes were of a similar condition, very simple and often run down looking.  Just for verification, I looked up the poverty rate for the area, and it was nearly 40%. That's very sad.

 

Talking about this with Jen, she and I wondered if our government hadn't given these lands to the Native Americans because of the harsh almost uninhabitable conditions here. Other than raising cattle, there seems to be very little sustainable farming here.

Now, on the western side of the canyon, the Havasupai have a nice Grand Canyon business going.  There you can do the only 1 day rafting of the canyon, purchase helicopter tours, or walk on the their famous skywalk.....at a price.

Rafting....$500/ person
Helicopter ride.....$200/person
Walk the skywalk......$80/adult

Yikes!  That's too rich for us.

As we passed through the Native American lands, we came to a bridge over the Colorado River.  We pulled off for a potty break and to walk on the pedestrian bridge for a better view.

I'm hoping this sign is to discourage bungee jumping enthusiasts

The view was of the river and canyon was spectacular, and it was relaxing to watch people on rafts floating slowly down the river.

The river had a lot of algae and was flowing very gently, I'm guessing because of their lack of rain.

The bridge we drove over

 

From here, we continued on and decided to drive directly to the park to see the north rim rather than go the campground.  

We decided to do a very easy hike called the Bright Angel Trail.  While it was not physically taxing, it did have a lot of anxiety producing drop offs, sometimes on both sides.  Beth was having to do a lot of positive self talk to get her to the end of the hike, but she didn't give up.

Here's a short video of the hike and the views:

On the way back to our campground, we stopped by some of the park signs for some group pictures.

The terrain here was unique compared to what we had seen so far with huge green meadows and tall pines.  There were signs for bison crossing, and it reminded me a lot of the type of large open spaces we saw in the Grand Tetons/Yellowstone where we saw hundreds of bison.

I bet we're the first family to ever take a picture here.

Note to self:  Bring a mini tripod next time so you don't have to use rocks and hats to get a full group picture.

Our campsite for the night.  Running water by the bathrooms, but no showers and pit toilets.  We're roughin' it tonight.

  

That night there was a ranger presentation in a nearby amphitheater called "The Secret Life of Trees."  



 
As we set-up our campfire we started preparing some tree puns to use.  We dropped these on the naturalist as we sat down in the amphitheater:

• Oooh, there's a lot of people here, this presentation must be very poplar!  
• Can we ash you a question?
• Its chilly, I bet you wish you had a fir coat.
• Is is Oak-kay if I sit here?
• I am re-leafed that we can learn something new today.
• We always try to sycamore knowledge.

Our naturalist was very tolerant of our groan-worthy puns.  As a science and nature geek I found the presentation really cool and informative.  I felt like I learned a lot from what she shared.  For example, I never knew that trees won't thrive in a greenhouse environment because they need stress (like pushing from wind) to form strong roots and bark. 

 

As she progressed through the slideshow, we could feel the temperature dropping considerably.  How could this be? We had hours ago driven through the desert where it was over 100º and now we were needing to put on hoodies and stocking hats for warmth. As soon as the presentation finished we rushed over to the campfire which fortunately Rogan had been keeping going.


We saw that the sky was really clear and star-filled so we decided to go out in the field at the front of the campground where there was less light to look at them.  When we turned off our flashlights we were awestruck at the number and clarity of the stars.  We could just make out the Milky Way.  I wish I had a camera which could have captured this.  I tried putting the GoPro on time lapse pictures, but all I got was 976 pictures that looked like this:

Looks kinda like a big black rectangle, huh

 

As we were getting ready for bed, I heard the muffled conversation of Greg with someone outside the van.  Apparently, a van with 2 girls had pulled into the campground without a reservation hoping to get a site.  Well, the campground has been booked up for months.  They asked if they could park on our site and said they'd be gone early in the morning.  They even offered to pay us.  Greg, said no to bother and it was fine.  The girls had pulled out in the morning before any of us even woke up.  I figured this was karma for a time we had to share a campsite with another family many years ago.

That night we bundled up big time because it was the coldest night yet.  We think it dropped down into the lower 30's.  Jen wore five layers on top:  a t-shirt, long sleeve shirt, fleece jacket, hooded sweatshirt, and a windbreaker/rain jacket.  She had on two pairs of socks, sweatpants and a pair of Shane's pants below the waist.  

"I still woke up during the night freezing."

                                                                    -Jen 

The next day we will head to Lake Powell to see Antelope Canyon and Rainbow Bridge.

~Shane

A Grand Adventure - Day 3 (The Grand Canyon South Rim Hikes)

Today we would get our first look at the Grand Canyon.  The campground was a stop on a wonderful shuttle system provided by the national park that would take us to all the canyon viewpoints and trails.  All of the national parks in the area, in fact, have great shuttle services to lessen the burden of traffic and parking. 

We rode the shuttle with the intent of hiking the South Kaibab trail.  There are different shuttles that run back and forth along the extensive rim of the canyon and they pick up riders every 10 or 15 minutes - super convenient.

For those not into hiking, there are great scenic viewpoints all along the rim itself and many paved and walkable/bikable trails, too.  At our first stop, we got out and took in the amazing view.  I'll be honest, pictures just don't do justice to the enormity or the beauty.

A sign in the park read, "Numbers give grandeur to the canyon; your experience provides it meaning"

I'm into numbers, and there are some of the statistics about the canyon that are just mind blowing.  Here's a few:

• The bottom of the canyon is about a vertical mile from the rim.
• The canyon averages 10 miles across,
• The canyon is 277 miles long.
• The square miles of the canyon is slightly larger than the state of Delaware
• The Colorado River has been eroding the canyon for 10 million years
• The Colorado River, which you can sometimes see at the bottom, is 100 yards wide (a football field) - though it looks much smaller from the top
• The rocks exposed by the erosion at the bottom of the canyon were formed 2 billion years ago (the earth is 4.5 billion years old)

We took lots and lots of pictures, of course.

Rogan hates taking pictures.  He begrudgingly posed for this family picture

If you have a nice camera, be sure to bring it.  Rogan had fun using the "depth effect" on his iPhone 7+.

Depth effect adds blur to the background to make the subject "pop."

 

Something to know for those with fears of heights is that there are almost no fences or barriers along the rim.  I'm not generally afraid of falling, but when I would step close to the edge and look down at the sheer cliffs, something in my reptilian brain was screaming, "DANGER! DANGER!" 

Mikah enjoys taking a pensive shot looking at the scenery

Many people have either died or been badly injured trying to get that perfect picture.  And the drop-offs here are no joke.  Rogan wanted to take a picture that made it look like he was right on the edge (which he was), but it wasn't as dangerous as this shot made it look (and to be honest he wasn't as fearless as this made him look, either.)

His twitter post with this pic; "Getting edgy"

The other thing I'll admit is, I thought it was very possible, that I'd look out, see the canyon, and that would be it.  Yep, I've seen it now

I didn't think it would look that different from other perspectives on the rim, but it really does.

   

The light of different times of the day even make the rocks look different colors.

 

Really scenic spots sometimes have safety bars.  Look over them and you'll see lots of hats and water bottles that have been dropped, too.  Look closely at the picture below and you can make out the Colorado River on the left side.

Time to hike inside the canyon!

For those up for the real challenge, the South Kaibab trail will take you all the way down to the bottom of the canyon to a place known as Phantom Ranch.  There is a campground, cabins, and a simple restaurant there. 

From there, you have 3 choices: hike back up the south side again, hike up the north rim, or stay the night there at the ranch.  Reservations for Phantom Ranch and campground book up many, many months in advance.  Oh, right, you also have the option to ride mules down the canyon, too, but those book almost a year in advance.  The only sign of them we saw on the trail was their left behind road apples.

Day hikes into and back out of the canyon are highly discouraged by the park service because of the extreme temperatures in the valley (often in the 120's) and the sheer difficulty of the hike.  Many rescues missions are done by the park service to help hikers who bit off more than they could chew.  Even for short hike, start early in the day when its cool and bring plenty of water.

Hiking down into the canyon and back is really like climbing a mountain in reverse, you go down then up instead of the other way around.  The canyon is a vertical mile (5,000 feet) down to the Colorado River and then the same back up again.  They estimate hiking 4-6 hours down and 6-10 hours back up.

Here's some video to give you an idea of what the trail looks like:

As you can see, the trails are pretty nice and wide, though on the way back, you may find your self hiking along the edges more especially as you pass other hikers.

The switchbacks are pretty steep and your quads will get a workout.  Going back up these is considerably more challenging.  They tell you to estimate that it will take twice as long to get back up as it took to go down, so I'd recommend not over estimating what you can hike in one day.

We were amazed and a little disturbed by some of the choices made by hikers.  We saw people hiking with disobedient toddlers trying run away from a grandparent to look over the edges.  We also saw people hiking with babies in carriers.  I'm not trying to be all judge-y here, but I'll just say that wouldn't be my choice.

Dad; "Remember when we took you hiking in the Grand Canyon?" Kid: "No"

We decided to do a much less extreme hike than the down and back up.  Our goal was to hike to Ooh Aah Point.

Some encouragement on the way.

 

Lucas posing in the shade

 

Great views all around

  

And, we made it!

Now time to hike back up.  That's a little more challenging.

Getting ready to enter into the switchbacks

 

Kids, full of energy, hike ahead on the switchbacks while parents rest in the shade.

 

Reaching the top and enjoying the views again.

 

 

The hike to Ooh Aah Point was not too difficult for a moderately fit person to do.  I'd highly recommend it.

Next we hopped on the shuttle again to see some other scenic viewpoints.  We stopped at Abyss, Hermit's Rest, and Mojave.

Lots of pictures. 

Here are our amazing and photogenic travel companions, the Halls.  Beth liked this spot because of the safety rails.

I was nearly attacked by a hungry Kaibab Squirrel just before this picture was taken.

Again, lots of foreign travelers.  

I liked this guy's shirt. (I know, I'm a child)

 

Many very cool twisting, partly dead trees.

 

 

Beautiful nature overload!

 

We ate dinner at the Grand Canyon Village (Highly recommended, a great meal for about $40).  

That night, we drove to the nearby campstore, and then hiked a short trail to a get to a sunset view of the canyon.

I snapped a picture of Lucas by a cool tree that we found by a great secluded spot to watch the sun go down over the canyon.  Soon after this Luke had an intestinal emergency to address back at the camp store restroom.  His run set a new (but unfortunately, unofficial) world record for the mile.

Getting great sunset pictures is an art that I haven't yet mastered.  Still, among the group of us, we managed to capture a few good ones.

 

The sun seems even brighter out west. Bring your shades!

 

They say the sunsets bring out the many colors in the rock.  This picture seemed to capture that.

 

 

It was a great end to a great day.  Tomorrow we head out to the north rim of the canyon.  Question to answer: can it look that different from the other side?