Grand Canyon - Day 2

 

    I guess we enjoyed the darkness of the Frontier cabin since we both slept until nearly 9:30AM.  After we got up and started moving, we went to the dining room to find out about breakfast.  Unfortunately, we missed the breakfast window, so we tried the coffee bar.  They closed at 10:00AM.  The deli was open, but they were switching from breakfast to lunch.  Jennie picked up a cinnamon roll and I picked up a slice of pizza.  The look on her face said it all.  I noticed in the picture that she was holding the fork in between certain fingers in a "Fork You" kind of way.

   

    After our improvised breakfast, we packed up our camera stuff, got into the car, and drove to some of the places in the North Rim.  Our first stop was Vista Encantada, a picnic spot along the way.  There were some nice views of the canyon from this spot.  We sat under a tree, taking in the scenery and cool breezes blowing in the wind.  We spent about 15 minutes under the tree.

    We got back in the car and kept on driving.  We made it to the parking lot where the Cape Royal trail starts.  We started walking the trail and came across the first view of Angels Window.  We grabbed some photos of the window, and continued walking out onto the the arch that extended over the canyon.  The views were stunning and made us feel like we were floating above the canyon.  According to online sources, Angels Window was formed over 300 million years ago.  The part we walked on was made up of a layer of rock called the Supai Group.  For comparison, the top layer of the Grand Canyon (the Kaibab Formation) was formed 270 million years ago, and the bottom layer where the Colorado River flows was formed 1.8 billion years ago.  The Supai Group is made out of a soft sandstone layer called the Redwall Limestone and a harder layer known as the Supai Formation.  Over hundreds of millions of years, the Redwall Limestone layer was eroded by wind and water.  Only the Supai Formation is left. Eventually, it will collapse.  Angel's Window was possible named when the first explorers of the Grand Canyon saw the arch and were in awe of its shape and the breathtaking views of the canyon.

    We ran into a couple from Nuremberg, Germany, who offered to take the picture of Jennie and I.  They were making a crazy tour of the West.  They had flown into Vegas, visited Bryce Canyon, Zion, and were going to hit Moab, Yellowstone and several other parks along the way.  

    We decided that it was going to be too far of a walk to get to Cape Royal, so we headed back to the car and drove back towards Point Imperial.  Imperial is linked to the Cape Royal highway by a bendy, side road, which climbs the narrow valley of upper BrightAngel Creek.  The surrounding forest was nearly destroyed from fires, but groves of Aspen Trees have started to spring up.  From the parking lot it was a short walk to the viewing point overlook which jets out over the canyon, with the land falling away on three sides.  From the viewing point we had a great view of the Echo and Vermillion Cliffs, the upper Colorado canyon and a flat plateau east of the Colorado River.  Point Imperial is the highest spot in the Grand Canyon at 8,803 feet.

    We got back into the car and drove back to the lodge.  Jennie stopped in the saloon and picked up a slice of pizza.  After pizza time, we grabbed a few cold beers, found a place on the patio and sat there for a couple of hours until it was time for dinner.  As usual, dinner was great.  Since our reservation coincided with sunset, the views from our table were incredible.  After dinner, we made our way back to the cabin and were out pretty fast.

Grand Canyon North Rim - Day 1

    About one month ago, Jennie and I planned to make a long weekend trip to Santa Fe, NM. We had the place picked out, and a general idea of what we wanted to do. Unfortunately, Jennie ended up with a serious infection which required a few ER visits and an overnight in the hospital. We decided to scrap that trip and do something a little closer to home. At first we thought about the White Mountains, but I thought it would be more fun to take Jennie to the Grand Canyon's North Rim. I first visited that location in 2017 on the way back from a trip to Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park. Ryan and I spent all of 30 minutes looking around and were back on the way home.  I checked the lodging situation and found that the cabins were wide open.  I booked a Pioneer Cabin for us and we were off.

The drive North was uneventful.  We stopped in Flagstaff for a quick lunch at Oreganos and we were off for the remainder of the drive.  As we were approaching the Navajo Bridge near Marble Canyon, we spotted some wild horses in the desert with Vermillion Cliffs behind them.  We found a place to park and grabbed some photos of the horses.

    We drove a few more miles and stopped at the Navajo Bridge.  We walked out to the center of the bridge to grab a few pictures, and quickly made our way back to the visitors center.  It was 103 degrees when we got out of the car.  After a quick look at the gift shop items, we were back in the car until we stopped at the Cliff Dwellers location.  The name Cliff Dwellers makes you believe that Navajo members used to dwell in the cliffs.  However, the history behind the name comes from something completely different.  In the 1920's, Blanche Russell, a successful dancer with the Siegfried Follies was was traveling with her husband Bill.  Legend has it that they broke down near this location and liked it so much, they decided to stay.  We spent about ten minutes outside and got back in the car.

The rest of the trip consisted of the drive from Marble Canyon to the North Rim.  We parked the car, made a quick trip to a viewpoint and grabbed the key to our Frontier cabin.  Jennie is not the camping type, a was a little worried about this arrangement.  I decided to mess with her and told her that we do not have our own bathroom, but a shared one for the camp.  The look on her face was a mix of WTF, I'm leaving and many other emotions.  I let her off the hook and we found cabin 93.  After a look around the cabin, we grabbed our bags and unpacked.  This was a true cabin with no air conditioning and a few bugs making our way inside.

    We had dinner reservations for 8:15, so we headed over to the lodge to watch the sunset. While there was no dramatic clouds or sunset, you can't go wrong with the views from the North Rim.  We grabbed some cocktails and headed to dinner around 8:00.  They got us a table as soon as we checked in and we ordered a salad and trout, which we shared.  Both of the dishes were huge, and we ended up having food leftover despite two people sharing.  After dinner we rolled back to the cabin, where it was lights out around 10:00.