28 May

We left Flagstaff and followed a scenic route thru to the Grand Canyon (GC) where we parked at the visitor’s centre and followed the signs to the first view point of the GC. It is a bit like Katomba in the Blue

Mountains west of Sydney. You just suddenly come across the view. But boy what a view!! It is certainly well named, as the Big Canyon, the Huge Canyon or any other name would not do justice to this place. For the first time we were in tourist country with bus loads of Asians pushing and shoving for a view. We went into the visitors centre and sussed out the hiking and biking and then found our camping site in the National Park camp. We are booked here for three nights but have to shift each day to a new site. After lunch we set off on the bikes following the rim of the canyon 8 miles to Hermits

Rest, We stopped many time to take in the view. Unfortunately it is cloudy and the canyon is a bit hazy. Several times we could see the Colorado River 5000ft below. There are free shuttle buses which follow various routes. We were allowed to use one of these routes for parts of this ride. The rest was on dedicated paths. The round trip ended up being about 20 miles so we well deserved the beer when we got back to “Ernie”.

29 May

After changing sites we biked 3 miles to the head of the Kaibab Trail which descended down into the canyon. The weather today is crystal clear and the views are spectacular. The trail started as a series of zig zags dropping quickly below the rim of the canyon. There are various points down the trail where you can stop and return. We continued on and left most of our fellow hikers. At our lunch stop we decided to return, but some returning hikers told us we were not far from the

end of the trail and we could see great views of the Colorado River if we continued. It was well worth the extra effort. We had walked only 3 miles to get to this point but had descended over 2000ft. The return back up was not too bad as we took it fairly slowly. What a hike!! There are only two ways to descended into the canyon. Either you hike or ride a mule. We were passed by several mule trains either going up or down. As the track is narrow and the drop offs huge, we thought our method was the best! One of the impressive things at the Grand Canyon is that they have resisted the usual tourist gimmicks. No chair lifts/cable cars etc here. Aircraft are not even allowed to

fly over this area.

                                                       

30 May
After another change of sites and a phone call to book a camp to pickup our registration for “Ernie”, we

packed a lunch and were back on the bikes for a short ride to the rim and down the Bright Angel Trail.

This is a similar trail to the one we did yesterday but this time we are in a much tighter canyon with reduced views out into the GC. There were more tourists on this track but again most headed back up after the first “rest house” We descended 2120ft for 3 miles before stopping for lunch. It is much hotter today (95F) so we are going thru the water. Of the two hikes we have done, the Kaibab trail was the best but the Bright Angel was also well worth the effort. The walk up took us much longer and we were back at “Ernie” for a long rest before biking back up to the rim to watch the sunset. The colours and the light at sunset are spectacular.

31 May

An early start as we were keen to get to Desert View Camp. It is first come first served and we had heard

that it filled up early. From Mather Camp to Desert View Camp is 26 miles mostly following the rim of the GC. As it happened the camp did not fill up until around 3:00pm!! We walked to the visitors centre to find out what to do and see the view. After lunch we walked to a the “Watch Tower”, built around 1912 , which gives a 360 degree view of the canyon from 4 stories up. This has been a really lazy day, much needed after the last three which have been physically full on. There are Elk wandering around the everywhere. They seem to be

very used to people.

1 June

After cleaning, we drove back towards Mather to a couple of view points we missed yesterday. At Lipan Point we stopped and had

lunch. At this place we could see long stretches of the Colorado River 6000ft below. The river has carved out the GC over millions of years. It looks like a small stream but is actually 300ft wide with huge

rapids. After a lazy afternoon we walked back to the rim and with our chairs, a bottle of wine and some crackers and watched the sunset in style. What a site. The colours and the lighting change minute by minute.

2 June

From the south rim of the GC to the north rim is 10 miles as the crow flies but 190 miles by road. It was a very pleasant drive however. The first 100 miles we followed the south rim with the canyon getting narrower and narrower. We also descended about 7000ft to the Navajo Bridge across the Colorado River. Along the north rim of the

canyon we climbed 8000ft to a forestry camp at Jacob Lake. (very poorly named as there is no lake!) We are at 8500ft camped in huge Ponderosa Pines. We enjoyed a short walk thru the forest.

3 June

We followed the no exit highway 40 miles into the North Rim camp where we had managed to book one night. We will try and extend

this tomorrow. On the way in we saw a herd of Bison including some calves. After a short bike ride to the visitors centre we returned for lunch and planned our time here. We had a nice easy walk along the rim to Bright Angel Point. The views were great. We could easily see the trails we had walked on the south rim. The North Rim is quite different from the south rim because this rim is more isolated and 1000ft higher. The south rim is in semi desert with stunted Juniper

trees where the north rim is forest with Ponderosa pines. The other difference is that the tourist buses do not come here so there are no hordes of tourists. At sunset we walked to the end of the camp and watched the changing light on the rock faces.

4 June

We failed to get another night here so drove a short distance to the Widforss Trailhead for a 10 mile return hike. We followed the north rim of the GC for about half the hike with spectacular views down the Transept Canyon, The next part of the hike was along a beautiful forest valley with Ponderosa pine, Aspen and Oak before emerging onto Widforss Point with one of the best views of the GC. We sat and had lunch before the return hike back to

“Ernie”. One of the best hikes we have done. The extra altitude here (8500ft) makes quite a difference. We are breathing a bit harder on uphill bits, and the food takes longer to cook! The boiling point of water is much lower. We continued on to a forest camp at De Motte about 20 miles from the north rim. This will be our last night in Arizona. We have been in Arizona and New Mexico, apart from a short stay in West Texas, for 8 weeks and it has been great!!

5 June

An easy 90 mile run to our planned stop at Hurricane. We stopped on the way at an old Mormon fort and

spring. It had been built around 1860 when the Mormons had settled in this area. The ranger took us thru the building. Very interesting. Paul would have been interested as the main activity was cheese making using the milk of the “Tithed” cows from the church. Further down the road we crossed into Utah and down a steep incline into Hurricane. We went to the visitors centre and found where the State

Park we wanted to stay in was. We are now at 3500ft and it’s very hot. (108F) To our surprise we discovered that Quail Creek State Park was a beautiful dam. It reminded us of Lake Dunstan but the rocks and hills are either pink or red. We spent the rest of the day swimming and sitting in the shade of some trees. We even had a swim at 9.30pm.

6 June

A big shop up at Wal-mart. Even bought a lamp so that we can sit outside at night. The liquor laws are different here. You can buy beer in the supermarket but spirits and wine are only sold at the State Liquor outlets. There are not many around but fortunately we found one not far away. We are camped at a nice RV Park because we needed catch up with our vehicle registration from Florida. It had arrived and we proudly installed our Florida plate with 1 years registration on it. What a battle this has been!! We went out to a local restaurant for dinner to celebrate my birthday in 2 days time. As we walked home at 9:30pm we passed a sign that said it was 95F!