Hot Hole Hiking

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I spent my summer working odd jobs in wooster, Ohio. the tedium eroded my sunny disposition. i couldnt bear to get lost in the undulating waves of past and present. i couldnt hold on to any train of thought. i had nothing to hold on to at all. so all it took was a whim to uproot me. i have moved to the island of Kauai. but first i wanted to spend a week with Vince Mariola in Arizona.
This was not my first trip to the Grand Canyon. my first time was with my brother Zach just after graduating from college. i had visited the wide gaping abyss 4 times but i had never ventured beyond the rim. That was to change. Vince had secured permits for camping on the canyon floor.
Vince picked me up from the Flagstaff Airport in his toyota pickup. Vince had classes that evening and the next day at Northern Arizona University where he is working to attain his masters in environmental sciences. while he attended classes i took his bike into town to look for camping equipment. flagstaff has a great selection of outdoor outfitters. i bought a lightweight compact sleeping bag and headlamps for vince and myself. The old part of Flagstaff is cool. if you look closely, the buildings that are older seem to radiate from the old train station. the rail going through flagstaff is still very active as witnessed by anyone wanting to cross from one side of the town to the other. Also very noticable is that Route 66 passes through Flagstaff. hotels proclaim their connection with the nostalgic thoroughfare and restaurants remind you that you are on no ordinary highway. the air is dry and mountains can be seen rising outside the city. Flagstaff caters to the hoard of college students biking and congregating about the hotspots and to the Grand canyon tourists strutting about in their outdoor sporting clothes.
After stocking up on food and supplies and finally finding suitable footwear(vince convinced me that my well-worn sneakers wouldnt give me the support that i needed for the 40lb pack i would carry), vince and i shared a pizza and went over our plans with maps spread across our booth. We wanted to take the Hermit Trail down into the canyon and to camp at the river at the very bottom. The ranger was hesitant to give us backcountry permits at all because the access roads to this area had been closed off. Vince convinced the ranger of his experience and our willingness to meet a ranger at 5am where we would park a couple miles from the actual trailhead so the ranger could drop us off a little closer. on top of this modification the ranger absolutely refused to give us permits to camp at Hermit Rapids. he cited the distance and considered that the temperature was going to be around 105 degrees and concluded that our plan was unsafe. he agreed to give us permits to camp a couple miles short of our planned distance at Hermit Creek. Of course we had no intention of heeding the warning and planned to push through to the river. so we packed our supplies and drove to the canyon that night. we car camped at our meeting spot after a quick un successful search for coffee filters at hotel desks and janitor closets. we parked at the "marriott" which was a burnt out husk of a cabin. it was really just a foundation, a chimney, and some of the old frame. the ranger dropped us off about a mile from the trailhead.
we hiked to the rim and down into the canyon as the sun rose. we each had half of the food and supplies. we each carried a gallon and a half of water mixed with electrolytes. every step offered a gorgeous view. the path was dry and dusty. the sparse plants were dry woody underbrush as opposed to the pines and spruces on the rim. we snacked and hydrated, stopping a few times to drink in the view. the only distraction, real evidence of the real world was the noise pollution from helicoptors carrying tourists into the canyon. we walked and talked and hydrated and sweated all morning. we were down to about a quart of fluid each when we ran into two fellas with maybe eastern block? accents. they were huddled in the shade of a bank of earth. we asked if they were ok. they told us that they were nearly out of water and as they pointed behind us, told us that the creek had dried up. we told them we had heard water earlier. they said that they had been looking for water because they had a long way to go and the sun was high in the sky. they told us they would wait until the sun began to set to continue. we wished them well and went on our way. about 5 minutes after crossing the dry creek bed, we reached the cold rushing water of the Hermit creek. where the cool water spilled over a large boulder, there was a deep pool damned loosely at the lower end with rocks. This was hermit creek. our backcountry permit allowed us to camp here. vince headed to the open air composting toilet as i stripped and slid into the cool, refreshing water. after the rejuvenating dip we sunned ourselves on a boulder in the middle of the creek and ate lunch. with full stomachs and the sun high and the temperature soaring, we crept into the shade of some woody underbrush near the pool and napped. vince did some studying as i headed to the compost toilet. we took advantage as the alternative is digging a hole and packing out toilet paper. i struck up a conversation with a girl we had passed hours ago. she worked as a guide hiking in the canyon. her client had gotten tired a few miles back so they dropped her client's bag and when they had arrived, the guide hiked back to the pack to bring it the rest of the way. she told me that i looked like i was from Prescott and that she could get me a job guiding hikers in the canyon. Vince and i got back on the trail and headed toward the river. we reached the river around sunset, which comes early when you are in a big hole. there was no one at the campsite. it was all sand along the Hermit Rapids. The rapids consisted of 5 waves big enough to swallow a 12 person raft, and apparently since the recent flooding(a native american village along the river had been evacuated by helicopter two weeks before) there had appeared a sixth wave. the sound of the rushing water was soothing. we used vince's clay water filter to refill our water supplies. we set up camp and began making dinner. it was so warm at night i just laid on a mat in the open. i stared into the heavens watching shooting stars in wonder noticing all the stars behind the stars i was used to. we had cowboy coffee(boil water, add grounds to pot, drink, clean grounds from teeth) with oatmeal for breakfast, dug a couple holes, and packed up. we started up the creekbed away from the river with vince in the lead. vince suddenly jumped across the stream and yelled at me to stop. confused i took a hop backwards and looked around bewildered. and there is was. the writhing thick 4 or 5 foot long rattlesnake. vince had nearly stepped on it and i was almost the second attack. The snake coiled up ready to strike. vince and i stared at it amazed at our good fortune. in all of his years in Arizona this was the first time he had encountered a rattlesnake. we spent the next few miles discussing what we would have done if one of us had been bitten. i felt vince was more likely to be the victim because he was first. vince said that he just scared it enough to make it mad and my second approach made me the more likely victim. in any case at first we thought Healthy would tie a tournequet. and suck as much venom out as possible. then Healthy would take just enough water and run to the rim. we decided that this would take too long and the bitten would probably be dead. so we decided that the best chance would be to hobble down to the river and hope for a raft to come down to the rapids. running to the rim would be useless. it may take two to get attention from the distracted rafters over the roar of the rapids. also if the bitten was to die it would suck to just die alone. so we hiked on talking snapping pictures. we noted how much more interesting it was to be able to look back down into the valley and have knowledge of the nooks and crannies of the area we were looking over. we had lunch on a raised rock at the end of a peninsula of land that dropped away all around it. it afforded us a 360 degree open view that just made me feel like the luckiest, most fortunate person on the planet. after the new fuel and lighter packs i led the way up the trail at a quick pace. after 10minutes, i came around a corner where to my right the earth fell away hundreds of feet and to my left a shelf of rock rose along the path. a loud dry rattling sound to my left startled me as i turned the corner. i stepped quickly to the edge of the dropoff and turned to see another angrier rattlesnake rattling vigorously at about neck height. its tongue was flailing, its tail was vibrating, and its dead eyes stared me down as it slithered toward a nearby rock. vince caught up and was amazed after never seeing one in the past that we had run into two withing a few hours. i told vince that it meant something and that if we ran into another i was just going to let it bite me. that was the excitement of the canyon. like i said before every step gave a different view of the canyon's beauty and awe-inspiring landscape. when we hiked out of the canyon we had a few extra miles to walk to find the truck. we went back to flagstaff and spent a night there. then the next night we drove south west out of flagstaff and camped on the edge of a raised area that looked down over sedona. i spent my remaining time in flagstaff preparing for Kauai. vince and i were going to sell plasma but it didnt work out. we ate thai food and mexican. vince took me to the airport early in the morning. i left my hiking boots with vince. the girl at the ticket counter upon hearing my destination, told me that she is from kauai. for some strange reason there is a connection between the red dirt of sedona, arizona and the red dirt of kauai. Strange enough, i was met in the seattle airport by my friend Rob miller and his girlfriend danielle who were heading back home to kauai after visiting the mainland.

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Photos

Lunch Table
We had 360 degrees of incredible views for lunch.

Morning View
Dawn at the rim of the canyon.

The Canyon is Gorgeous
I can point out where we hiked and camped here. It is more interestin after spending time there. But it is still beautiful.

Cooling Off
It felt nice to drop the 40lb pack and escape the 105 degree heat. There were fish that nibbled at my leg hairs.

Ravine in the Canyon
We are on our way to the River.

Dishwashing is Dangerous
Vince rinses out a pot near where a girl disappeared and was never found.

Rattlesnake Party
He was big and thick poised for attack. vince and i stepped within his strike zone.

Water Supply
Water should be your most important consideration. Vince brought A good pump filter. no nasty iodine tablet taste.

Rock Layers
You can see the history of Earth here. And it is beautiful.

Rattlesnake Party 2
This one was smaller than the first but much angrier.

Our Lunch Table at a Distance
We ate on the raised area on the peninsula at the lower right.

Our Campsite
This is the view from our campsite overlooking Sedona(to the left).