The Grand Canyon

“Going down is optional, coming up is mandatory”
“Don’t underestimate the canyon”
“Warning: Do not attempt to hike from the canyon rim to the river and back in one day”

So read the many warnings on signs and in guides for hiking down the Grand Canyon. So I took a strenuous hike that was still (with warnings) listed as a day hike to Plateau Point along the Bright Angel trail. 6 miles one way, 3100ft elevation change, in the summer, in an Arizona desert. Started at 7:30am and got back up to the rim at quarter past one (under 6 hours—an average speed of just 2mph!), carrying and devouring 5L of water (there are a few stops along the way that are actually plumbed with running water, so that I overdid). I filled up my Akubra with water routinely and splashed it on my head and let my clothes get soaked to stay cool.

The reward at the bottom was simply magnificent. I stared at it and just sort of giggled for a few minutes. Plateau Point takes you up to an abrupt cliff face that towers over the Colorado River. From that cliff it’s another 1400ft down to the river. The vista was staggering. After all that work hiking down—and there’s still that much hiking to go, and this “innermost canyon” is still this gigantic! I kicked off my boots and socks, staying long enough for them both to dry out and to have a snack.

This panorama is stitched from thirteen photos, and I left some of the curvature artifacts to illustrate how big this is, how little my camera could capture in any one shot while zoomed out all the way. Staggering.

The Grand Canyon is so much bigger than I had imagined, and to think, I’ve only glimpsed it from a few angles. I’ve heard that helicopter tours are the best way to view “all” of it and comprehend its size.

While here I managed to meet up with an Aussie friend Asha who is touring the US for a bit. She brought a cousin and sister so we all got to hang out and chat for the couple of hours that their tour was here.

Some other interesting observations and facts: the bottommost layers of the stone are over a billion years old. Each layer has a distinctive color, which the dust on the trail picked up as well. So at various times my boots were whites, grey, red, brown, with variations of multi-million-year-old rock dust made from multi-million-year-old dinosaurs and plants and what have you.

The evening I arrived was terribly windy, so the view was obscured with tons of dust. Beautiful in its own right.

A National Park Service helicopter delivering supplies to Indian Garden.

The view of Plateau Point from the rim. The lush green valley just nearer is Indian Garden, a campground, a reliable creek that I dunked my hat into to stay cool, and a place that Native Americans historically farmed.