Last summer I finally fulfilled a lifelong dream: travelling the West Coast of the USA. One month. One car. Eight people. More than 3000 km. Just following the road. One of the main attractions during the massive road trip of 2016 and one we were already looking forward to for months, was Grand Canyon National Park. Breathtaking is the only word that pops into mind when thinking about this park. It’s such an amazing place and it’s like looking at a postcard, no matter what side you’re standing.
My advice when visiting this treasure of Mother Nature, is taking at least two or three days to discover the park and get to see everything you want. Because it will be plenty and just every spot marked on the map is worth your while. We arrived at the canyon after a speed visit of Las Vegas. Glad to leave the busy and buzzing city that never sleeps behind, we followed the route 66 to Tusayan, only a few miles away from Grand Canyon National Park. It was already late at night and we checked in in the Red Feather Lodge. After some late night shopping (buying tuns of water, salty crackers and energy bars to provide us with enough sugar and some fruit and bread for a picnic), we finally went to sleep.
Early in the morning, we took our car to the entrance of the Park and parked it at parking lot 2 (where there was still lots of space since we were there already at 8 o’clock in the morning). Since this was the first hike of the vacation and it was already 43 degrees celcius, we wanted to start up easy. While many other routes are definitely more adventurous, we decided on the popular Bright Angel Trail. The steep trail is one of the most touristic hikes you can take in the canyon, but don’t let it scare you. People tend to only walk a mile or so down the road. When you’re in for a day-long hike like us, you see the amount of people decreasing when descending the canyon.
With a backpack filled with liters of water and food and lots and lots of sunscreen on, we walked to the mile-and-a-half resthouse, 340m below the south-rim. It only took us an hour to get there, so our spirit still was up. Descending to the three-mile-resthouse (645m below the rim) was already a bit more difficult since the heath started to augment and become slightly unbearable sometimes. We refilled our water bottles and tried to eat our picnic, while being attacked by squirrels. After a rest in the shadow and moistening our clothes, we decided to give the Indian Garden a try. It’s 925m below the rim and there are no plants to provide you with any shadow. We knew the temperature would be up to 48 degrees celcius. After 4 hours, we finally arrived at the picnic spot.
And as they say: the only way is up, we knew it would take double the amount of time to get back to the top of the rim. Motivating each other, stopping every ten minutes to drink and eat, checking in with park rangers, we were able to make it to the top after 7 hours of hiking. Along the way, people were staring at us like we were living in the wilderness for a few months: our hands and faces red from the dirt, our clothes wet but it felt so good and amazing to hike and conquer the canyon. I saw things I cannot even describe and words as jaw-dropping, beautiful and amazing are not enough to describe the beauty and majestic feel of canyon. After our hike, we were welcomed by the delicious smell of the Grand Canyon Restaurant, just at the start of the Bright Angel Trail. We filled our tummies and enjoyed many more views of the canyon, while watching the sun set. And without lying, we all became a little bit emotional of our day and knew we would never forget this.
Snapshots & Postcards 