Wednesday, September 11, 2013

The Grand Canyon plays peek-a-boo.....

The weather system we dealt with yesterday was still hanging around today -not as bad for sure, but when we got up, the Grand Canyon was playing peek-a-boo behind the clouds:
Joe and I still headed out on the rim trail early, hoping things would clear out.  Joe, still displaying unassailable faith in the desert climate in spite of the overwhelming weather evidence, left his newly acquired rain coat at in the room….  So when it started drizzling, he decided to hop on the bus, and see the trail by stopping at the different overviews.  I stayed on the trail, where it soon stopped raining, and the weather started to clear out, and the sun rays started to shine on the Canyon.  


 What was wonderful is that the early rain kept most of the other tourists away, so at times, I had the Grand Canyon all to myself!  That was well worth dealing with a bit of rain!
Speaking of tourists:  The Grand Canyon national Park is REALLY crowded – and this is not even peak season.  I can’t imagine how it is in July or August…. When you’d have to be crazy to come anyway because of the temperature, but apparently, it still is the peak season….    I can’t say that it interfered with anything we wanted to do, but it’s just a bit overwhelming at times…  On a related note, here is the most random request-from-a-tourist/random-act of-kindness:  Joe was stopped by a very wet German tourist after this afternoon’s thunderstorm.  She said:  “Sir, I know this is an odd request, but I got very wet during the storm, and now I have a 3 hours bus ride to Las Vegas, and my socks are so wet and cold and uncomfortable.  Would you be willing to give me a pair of clean socks?”  Joe, being the kind-hearted man he is said yes, and gave her a pair of his socks…. 

 
 Getting back to our topic – the Grand Canyon: I met a pretty blue bird, and admired a lot of nice grasses and flowers on the 8 miles rim trail.



















It eventually got clear enough to view the Colorado river, all the way 1 straight mile down!  




And by evening, the sun was finally there, and we could view the entire breadth of the GC, and the sunset! And the lights!!!!


This is me, at sunset, very happy that the weather turned out so nice!
 



Tomorrow, I'm hoping to walk down the Bright Angel trail – 8 miles, 4500 feet down to the Colorado River – and, hopefully, back up.- that's the trail, seen from the rim.  (not 100% sure I can make it because I somehow hurt my anckle, so i'll see in the morning....)

1 comment:

KarenK said...

Good luck and be careful! Years ago- as a teenager, my husband ended up sleeping on the side of the canyon, with no water or food, cause he and his buddy thought they could walk down and up in a single day! They were awakened by the clattering of the donkeys coming down with the tourists astride.