Havasupai Indian Reservation May 24-27, 2008

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We flew into Phoenix to meet up with an old college friend Eric and 3 of his other friends from grad school, Jason, Justin, and Ryan. The canyon was beautiful and so lush along the river. It makes you feel so small to look up as you are walking along and see that much cliff. It was by far the most physically demanding thing I've ever done but it was worth it. We felt so proud after hiking 36 miles in 3 days.
On Friday we drove from Phoenix to Seligman, stopping in Prescott to do a little boulder climbing. I wasn't so sure about this at first but once you get up there it's really fun to climb over the rocks. I felt like a mountain goat! We had planned on sleeping in the parking lot Friday night but it was crazy cold (snow in Flagstaff) so we stayed the night in Seligman.
We got up early on Saturday and drove the rest of the way to the Havasupai parking lot and hiked the 10 miles to camp. I thought we would never get there but when we saw the first waterfalls it was worth it! It took us about 5 hours to make it down.
On Sunday morning we started out at 7am and hiked along the blue river the 7 to 8 miles to where it joined the Colorado River. We should have stopped and taken more snack breaks because by the time we made it to the Colorado we were exhausted! I put my feet in the river and they were frozen in like 2 minutes! After lunch we headed back to camp. The way back up Mooney Falls was pretty intense using the ladders, chains, and caves to pull ourselves up the almost 200 feet but it was really fun. We made it back around 6:30pm, we were so tired we ate dinner and went to bed.
On Monday morning we broke down camp really early to make it to the switchbacks before it got too hot in the afternoon. Jason and Justin left real early and booked it out to drive back to Phoenix to make it to the airport by 1pm. They made it out of the canyon in 3.5 hours, it's got to be some sort of record! Jeff and I stopped at the cafe in the village on the way out and had a wonderful breakfast to help fuel us for the day. As we were hiking out there were people passing by who had let the horses take their packs. We were hurting but I felt like it was our stuff and we should be carrying it. The last mile of switchbacks was really intense, I had to stop and rest at every turn but it made you feel so proud to have done it.

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Photos

Sara
Climbing boulders in Prescott

Jeff
Jeff on the rocks in Prescott

Parking lot
In the parking lot before going down on Saturday, it's cold!

on the way to Supai
stopping for lunch on the way down to the village

Mooney Falls
Mooney falls on the first day after hiking 10 miles to the village, we were so tired.

On the way to the Colorado
you can see the river on the left and some of the stuff we had to climb in front

crossing
Sara and Eric crossing the river

view from the river
stopping while crossing one of the many times and looking back at the cliffs

Colorado
We made it! The river was super cold and we saw several rafting teams go by while we had lunch

palms frame
after climbing down the rope and ladder to the water, thought the framing was cool