The Grand Canyon, Arizona...South Rim

Few natural features on earth compare with the Grand Canyon. The sediment layed down, layer by layer, one mile deep, by ancient oceans required 1.8 Billion years to accumulate. In a mere 4.5 Million years the Colorado River carved a mile down to the Vishnu Schist Basement Rocks that form the Canyon floor, leaving a vast collection of Mesas, Buttes, Towers, Plateaus and other features spread over 1.2 million acres, 277 miles long and as much as 15 miles wide. It makes one feel a little bit insignificant. It is so immense that it is impossible to describe it. Let me just say that you owe it to yourself to go there some day and I'll give you a few pictures here to whet your appetite but I promise you, they won't do it justice. We stayed at Mather Campground, at the South Rim for 5 days The South Rim Village is a bustle of activity containing the campgrounds, the hotels, Visitor center, stores, studios, restaurants and various services of the National Park Service needed to take care of the Canyon and it's 4.5 million visitors each year (44% of which are non-Americans. It's called a National Park, but it is a World Park). Cars, buses, The Canyon's free shuttle bus service (Marvelous), bikes, mules, and trains ply the canyon on a daily basis. It's busy, but it really works. and we had a great time. Our first adventure was a hike down the South Kaibab Trail to "Skeleton Point, over 2,000 feet below the rim, but still 3,000 feet above the Colorado River, the Architect of the Canyon. (Note the California Condor soaring majestically above the river) That was enough of a hike for us when you consider that at the end of the day we had to hike back up 2,000 feet to the rim at over 7,000 feet. Hot, dry, dusty, but wonderful. Getting down into the canyon is a lot of work, and the deeper you go, the hotter it gets, but it gives you the best views of the Canyon's many features. One of the finest facilities at the South Rim is the Greenway trail. Paved bicycle/pedestrian paths crisscross the venues of the Rim. We stayed 5 days and between the bikes and the Free shuttle buses never had to move the truck. Our second adventure was a bike trip to the "Hermit's Rest" at the far western side of the South Rim Village area. It's about a 10 mile trip out from the campground. Hermit's Rest can only be reached on foot, by bike, or by shuttle bus so the biking is traffic free when on the roads, and even bus free when on the Greenway which is not yet complete out to the end. The Greenway gives many views of the Canyon that are only available on foot or by bike. Kudos to the National Park Service for developing so many trails for foot and bike traffic. Much of the trip t0 Hermits Rest is down hill, so we elected to take advantage of the bike racks on the shuttles and rode home in style. We saw three Califonia Condors on the Hermit's Rest trip. They're hard to photograph. If you have time take the Ranger Talk on the California Condor given each evening at Kolb Studio. If you're real lucky you may get a visit from one of the stars of the show. Many days, or evenings, would find us on the rim trail visiting the various overlooks and view points of the Canyon Rim. We watched sunrise from Yavapai Point,and Sunset from the rim trail. We had lunch in some unbelievable places, and we will never forget this place..and we will come back.Spring is a marvelous time to visit the GrandCanyon as many of the plants are in bloom. The sun, being lower in the sky in the Spring provides exceptional light for photography and cooler temperatures for hiking. If you are at all able to hike then by all means hike at least part of the Canyon. When you hike down into the Canyon you experience far more the overwhelming size of it.

Just a reminder, most of the pictures in the Blog are shown in low resolution but a higher resolution version is available if you click on the picture.

Next: The North Rim, 10 miles and 8 hours away.