Hiking in the Grand Canyon, at least in both of my experiences, generally means early rising - not just because of the fact that everyone just tends to get up earlier with the visible light, but that starting early means beating the potential heat.
This morning's breakfast: A breakfast sandwich with egg and cheese and coffee.
The view as we ate was, of course, amazing. And yet even looking at the beauty, I am conscious of the fact that the shadow that keeps us from the sun is going to get smaller and smaller rather quickly.
With a repacking of everything and a quick dish wash, we are away!
The first part of our hike was across the Esplanade, perhaps 2 miles. This was a fairly level walk with slight rises and dips but no real elevation changes. It is also completely exposed to the sky: once the sun cleared the Canyon Rim, it started to heat up and give a hint of how truly unpleasant this would be in Summer.
A view showing the nature of the Esplanade. From this angle, it is hard to see that there is more down to go.
One of the few places of shade we passed.
More cryptosoil!
Getting closer to continuing our descent:
Our descent takes us down in Surprise Valley. The descent is a fairly steep one.
Looking down the trail. We are heading towards the formation that looks like a hill with the "smaller" rocks in front of it:
Looking back up towards the Esplanade:
"The Window": About halfway for the descent into Surprise Valley. The shade and breeze were welcome.
Another shot looking back up towards the Esplanade:
Surprise Valley. This is the start of our loop; we turn left at the Cairn in the road.
Another pretty steep descent - but wait, what are those? Actual trees?
Viewing these photos in the pre-dawn darkness with the temp outside at ten above, kinda warms the room up a bit. Trees? Seeds carried by the wind, critters, birds.....I'm guessing. Quite the selection of photos TB.
ReplyDeleteI hope it does, Nylon12! That sounds like a remarkably cold and depressing temperature to me.
DeleteI do not usually have a cliffhanger for a post, but this is as close as I can come to one. Updates next Tuesday!
Super cool. I did the hike down to phantom ranch around 20 years ago. Had a chance to hop onto a friends trip last minute due to cancelation as I guess that place books up a year out. One day down. Overnight at camp. Then up at dark-thirty to hike out.
ReplyDeleteI'd been to the canyon before. The drive up and take pictures at the south rim. So I didn't think much of the hike beforehand other than i like a good hike.
The canyon is one of those places that puts you in awe but also somehow allows to you not fully appreciate it from afar. Mt. Saint Helens was similar for me.
The hike down was unbelievable. The sediment striations and colors change as you go and as the light goes. No other way to see it. You must go down!
A thunderstorm from a tropical storm came in that night. The lightning was epic. Rain amounts were hard to believe. Took the creek from a clear 1' deep trickle to a raging orange monster. It sounded like a freight train. We though it to be thunder but it was actually the huge boulders it was hauling down.
The hike out was one of the most hectic and likely dangerous things I've done. Lighting. Flooding. The walls of the canyon were pouring down with silt and cutting loose constant rock slides. Some with boulders big as a VW. Trail was washed out. Had to double back a different route. Felt alive in so many ways.
Thanks for the photos. Brought back some fine memories.
Anon - "The canyon is one of those places that puts you in awe but also somehow allows to you not fully appreciate it from afar. Mt. Saint Helens was similar for me." That is an eloquently put statement.
DeleteThat sounds like quite an adventure! Having been down those paths, I can easily visualize everything you are speaking of in the storm - in fact, in the slot canyon that Deer Creek runs through (coming soon), there was an overhang that really looked like it was one good drizzle away from coming down on unsuspecting hikers.
Sadly (as seen at Navajo Bridge) the Glen Canyon Dam performed a release because of rain storms and thus the Colorado was not the blue I remember earlier but the orange-brown (more brown than orange) that you write of.
Although not nearly as dramatic as your hike, I left mine as well feeling very much alive.
You are so welcome. I am glad I could recall happy memories.
I miss the aspect without name of olden time Kodak days when such adventures of life had to thoughtfully be archived, in which the experience of taking the photograph was as much a part of the picture as the result.
DeleteYou only had so many clicks. or flash cubes, ha! and so consideration of light and perspective and frame, the time it takes to set it all up, and the post-production scarcity, really put some natural limits into the affair. Part quality control, part disappointment on the other side of that parking lot kiosk. A finger? A Lens cap?
Embedded in the act of documentation was the experience itself. You remembered where you were, what was going on, the smell of the air. Details partly lost, I think, by the ubiquitous digital filmstrip of life we all carry on with these days.
That said, the ability to hammer away with ease and sort it all out later (plus a bit of anti-aging editorial tools my wife insists upon) sure does make it easier to document and curate - especially when boulders are coming right at you!
I have a bunch of pics of the way down and zero on the way back. I wish I had stopped at least once. It looked like mars, if Quaid had actually activated the big alien ice melting machine.
Of course, I have years of my life unkept in the kodachrome or digital dust. We always have today! I need a hike. Thanks.
It is good and bad - yes, on the one hand taking a picture was an experience and you had a limited supply of pictures to take. On the down side, one never knew if the pictures were good or bad until weeks later - and a bad set of pictures or even overexposed film lost the entire trip photographically speaking.
DeleteTaking pictures with an electronic device is indeed much less of an event; on the brighter side I can instantly assess the quality of picture and act accordingly. And, I can take a lot more pictures and select the best ones - which, given my picture taking skills, is indeed a plus.
I was fortunate on my trip as the first two weeks were chilly enough to require a jacket much of the time. However, the "heat" was turned on the last week to 10 days or so and it got really hot quickly.
ReplyDeleteFinally you are down to Surprise Valley where my feet have trod 25 years ago. I'm sure the sharp rock that tore some flesh off my shin bone has no remnants left. It took the better part of six months upon my return for that to fully heal. It was either that or fall into a cactus and I chose the skinning.
Ed, I cannot imagine voluntarily entering the Grand Canyon during the heat of Summer. It is beautiful, but so are a lot of other cooler places.
DeleteI am sure that Surprise Valley is just as you left it, including the rock upon which you scraped itself. There is a certainly timeliness to the landscape; even the plants die slowly.