I took Rebecca on a short trip to visit the Grand Canyon. Nothing short of spectacular, and the pictures don’t even come close to doing it justice.
.JPG "Showing the team colors")
.JPG "Rebecca in front of a big hole in the ground")
.JPG "Rebecca climbing on some rocks...")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Some local wildlife")
.JPG "Rebecca and said wildlife")
.JPG "At the top of Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "Bright Angel Trail")
.JPG "A big rock")
.JPG "The big hole behind the big rock")
.JPG "more of the hole")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "The Colorado River")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Rebecca")
.JPG "Don't slip...")
.JPG "The Desert View tower")
.JPG "Being sneaky...")
.JPG "the tower")
.JPG "Do you remember where we parked?")
.JPG "Who is that guy?")
.JPG "more of the hole")
.JPG "hat day")
.JPG "Bright Angel")
.JPG "picture of pictures")
.JPG "self portrait")
.JPG "looking down")
.JPG "looking up")
.JPG "We drove across that")
.JPG "Bright Angel")
.JPG "what a view")
We stayed at the Red Feather Lodge in Tusayan, just south of the park entrance on highway 64. It wasn’t anything fancy, but it was clean and for the amount of time we were in the room, it was just fine. The only thing I was really disappointed with was that they didn’t serve any type of breakfast. For that reason alone I would not recommend staying there unless everything else is booked and you don’t mind fast-food for breakfast while you’re there.
The little town of Tusayan was nice. There are a few restaurants (stay away from the Mexican place) including a Wendy’s and a McDonald’s. Staying in town versus staying in the park really didn’t seem to make much of a difference. The pricing was much better out of the park for both lodging and food, and we were less than 15 minutes from the room to the rim of the canyon.
If you have a car I do recommend paying the $25 and driving into the park. There are shuttle buses, which are a great idea but get REALLY crowded towards the end of the day. Of course the flip side to that is if you’re there during a really busy time and there aren’t any parking spaces, but we didn’t have any trouble with that.
We did a lot of walking, though I wouldn’t quite call it “hiking” as we were never more than a few hundred yards from a highway or a sidewalk. The one major excursion we took on our own was down Bright Angel Trail. We only went to the first “rest stop” as there was fresh water there. It was a little less than 2 miles down… but seemed like 10 coming back up. So take plenty of water. And however much you think you need… take a little more.
All things considered… great little adventure. If you haven’t seen the Grand Canyon it is well worth the trip. But take your time. Stay a while. I was talking to a park ranger who said that the average visitor to the park spends only about 10 minutes looking at the canyon. It is worth much more than that. We would just find a spot and sit. As you look out over the rim of the canyon there is so much to see… so many colors in the rock (check out the post on the sunset). To go there and not just let yourself absorb it would be a real shame.
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