Grand Canyon by Zoe, she who is afraid of heights, will be continuously freaked out over the next 2 days….

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So we collected our car at Las Vegas airport and started driving out to the Grand Canyon – it took us about four and a half hours to get there. We drove past Hoover Dam, which Brett and I think is famous for some reason – possibly it’s the architecture of the dam?!?!? Then we drove into the Grand Canyon National Park, free entry because of National Park Day, or something – it saved us $25, so we were happy. Then we found our accommodation – which was on the rim of the South Canyon! We dumped our stuff and headed out to explore the Grand Canyon. The Grand Canyon has two visitor points, the South Rim, where we were staying and the North Rim, which was about 10 miles away from us as the crow flies. (Sorry, but everything is going to be in miles and feet, it’s the U.S. and I couldn’t be bothered to convert it…) The North Rim is closed during winter because the conditions are too dangerous, it’s about 1000 feet higher than the South Rim, so gets a lot more snow. So we couldn’t believe how big the Canyon was….I don’t even think that the photos that we took do it justice. So we headed over to the South Kaibab trail and attempted to walk down it. I got a little way down and freaked out, there’s snow on some parts of the trail, it’s slippery and we didn’t have crampons or walking poles to help us get down. Brett convinced me to walk down a little further which I did without any dramas, then we came across another section which is steeper than what we’d been walking down and was very snowy and slippery. I therefore freaked out and decided “I ain’t going any further”. Brett decided to continue on, but after slipping over for a third time, he decided that it was probably best that he headed back up. As we walked back up, we see this crazy dude running up the hill - MENTAL. We made it to the top safe and sound (I could have kissed the ground, but didn’t because of the donkey pooh) and caught the bus to another viewpoint whereby more photos were taken. We then walked around the top of the rim in the direction of the car (the newly named, Elk Buck). Along the way Brettie spoted some elk in the distance, we took some photos and walked further along until we were eye to eye with the elk. We took some photos quickly because we weren’t sure how friendly elk were and I didn’t like the idea of being pushed over the edge by an elk (see my heights thing makes me think of the most stupidest of things happening to me, all of which end up with me falling into the Canyon.) We walked a bit further up and we meet a male elk – we didn’t think that he was very old because he was a bit smaller but his antlers were pretty big. We took one photo of him but didn’t stay long because we weren’t sure if they attacked people….so we then walked around the rim of the Grand Canyon, every place we stopped to look we wanted to take another photo because it looked so different from every angle. We watched the sunset over the Grand Canyon which was again amazing – such beautiful colours in the rocks. Then we headed back to our hotel for dinner. Dinner was pretty good – Brett said his steak was delicious and we got a free slice of pie for dessert, yummy! We headed to bed, looking forward to watching the sunrise over the Canyon!

Day two at the Grand Canyon has us waking up early for the sunrise. We were disappointed by the stupid clouds blocking the view, but it was still pretty good waking up to the lovely view. Breakfast was yummy and very filling, which was good as our plan involved walking along the rim, in the other direction this time and maybe heading down another trial. So we checked out of our lovely cabin, which I thought was lovely, but we were able to hear the person next door to us snoring all through the night….we packed the car and headed off for our walk. We walked to the Bright Angel Trail and it is way too slippery to even attempt to walk down it, but we walked along the rim – the view of course was amazing and you could see where the trail wound its way down into the dark depths. We also saw a helicopter doing a tour of the Canyon. We had been wondering why we hadn’t heard any helicopters the night before and thought that the tours must only be done in the morning or something, but when we saw the helicopter it was so small! We realised that the tours are probably happening all the time, but we just can’t see them because the Grand Canyon is so big! So we walk back to the car and drive out to Hermits Rest, another view point. We could see the Colorado River which was very small of course but it was great to see the Canyon from a different perspective. We then drove to the Geology Museum, which is perched on the edge of the Canyon – they had an interesting exhibition of how the Canyon was formed, stuff about the different rocks, free binoculars to see out into the Canyon (pretty cool) and could also see the suspension bridge over the river. We learnt that it’s about 250 miles to drive from the South Rim to the North Rim. We also learnt some other facts about the Canyon and we once again realised that it’s just so big, that it’s so much more than just rocks, that there are different ecosystems down at the bottom and so much to explore. While we were there we also saw a video about the Canyon and what’s at the bottom – you can go white water rafting, canoeing and walking of course. It’s just so pretty. Of course its inspired Brett and I to come back here but we’ll have to train and get a lot fitter than we are before we can think of walking into the Canyon. Nevertheless its something that we want to do in the spring time, if anyone interested in coming!?!?!?!

So we left the Canyon, had a snack and then drove back to Las Vegas. We play cricket in the car and Brett makes over 300 runs! I’m thinking that he’s not an Australian, we can’t make those king of runs anymore!! We saw the glow of the neon lights of Las Vegas about an hour before we can see the city. Brett dropped me off at the bus depot while he dropped off the car. I watched the basketball until he got back and then we get on the bus to LA….arrived at about 5am in the morning, boo hoo….

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Photos

Hiking UP the trail and happy about it
To slippery to keep going down

Brett and his elk stick
With the elk looking on

Scenic shot
There's lots of these!

Brettie driving elk buck
Our trusty and massive SUV

Brettie pondering
Too close to the edge for me