The Grand Canyon

Sunday, October 27th.

Sunday we awoke to chilly weather and rain, which didn't fit very well into our plan of going to the Grand Canyon. But we hit the road anyway (since the truckstop certainly wasn't worth hanging out at either) and hoped that it would clear up. It soon did, and our drive through the Arizona desert was accompanied by perfect sunny weather. When we got hungry for lunch we exited the interstate after seeing signs for a Subway restaurant. As we drove off the exit ramp, however, we found ourselves in the middle of nowhere. A gravel road led into the flat desert landscape towards what looked like a powerstation. We decided to test the van's offroad capabilities, just for the experience of driving on a gravel road in the middle of the desert, leaving clouds of dust in our trail. The road (or lightly beaten path, as it was) dead ended at the railroad tracks. We thought that it would be pretty cool to get a picture of the couch parked across railroad tracks going through the desert, but we interpreted the barbed wire and "No Trespassing" signs as something less than an invitation to do stuff like that and so we decided not to. Instead we bumped our way back to the off-ramp and crossed the bridge across the interstate -- and found the Subway restaurant! Actually it was a combination of a gas station, Subway and RV campground, all housed in a large white sphere-shaped building in the middle of nowhere. Rather odd. But the food was fine (standardized fast food chains rarely bring surprises, so in other words it was as expected) and the woman that ran the RV park was nice enough to let us hook up to their modem jack to check email before we left.

We continued our trek towards the Grand Canyon which took us across pine-clad mountains just east of Flagstaff, through grassy plains at lower elevations (which we stopped to sofalog) and back into the desert landscape that we'd expected to find around the canyon. We entered Grand Canyon National Park from the east, which took us through the Painted Desert in a corner of the Navajo and Hopi indian reservations. Along the higway towards the park were several scenic outlooks and at most of them indians had set up booths where they sold traditional crafts. Most of them were nicely low-key and a few employed quite humorous advertising. As a twist on a well-known ad-campagin, one booth had a big sign that said "Got Turquoise?". Another group of indians had a whole series of small roadside signs advertising their booths. They announced their presence with a sign that said "Nice Indians Ahead Of You". Immediately after their booths was a sign that said "Oops, you missed us!", further along was one that said "Nice Indians Behind You" and finally; "Turn around NOW". Unfortunately they seemed to be closed down for the season, so we had no choice but to miss them.

We popped $20 to enter Grand Canyon National Park and pulled over at the Desert View tower for our first glimpse of the canyon. It truly is a sight that just makes you stop dead in your tracks and stop speaking. The vastness of it is awe-inspiring. The size of it is impossible to comprehend and at the same time it is a beautiful, peaceful place. Not only does it leave everyone speechless but it seems to absorb all sounds and surrounds itself with a majestic silence. As we looked at it the afternoon sun brought out the gorgeous red colors of the cliffs as they cast their last shadows of the day. A few clouds cast shadows on the flat and level country extending into the eastern horizon. The calm and seemingly harmless Colorado River wound its way through the bottom of the canyon and it seemed entirely improbable that it was that same river that carved most of the canyon long ago. We ascended the Desert View tower, a replica of an old Native American structure that despite its imposing position blends in well with the surroundings, to get the full view of the canyon from that angle -- quite amazing.

We continued westward along the rim of the canyon along a road that was mostly lined with trees on both sides but every once in a while the trees would part to reveal an absolutely stunning view of the canyon. We pulled in to several lookout points to see the canyon from every angle along the way. As we walked out to one of these points Dan spotted a hat that had no doubt blown of someone's head and was now neatly perched next to a small tree down the side of the canyon. The sight was just too tempting to resist, so he scaled the rock wall and made his way down the side of the cliff to retrieve the hat. He succeeded and realized that the hat and him were destined to meet; it fit him perfectly! :)

Adjacent to the fenced-in lookout point was a flat clifftop that stuck out into the canyon with great views to all sides. Several large, fallen rocks connected it to a point beneath the lookout point and we decided to climb out there seeing that a few other people had made their way out there already. We made it out there safely, although it required a fair deal of rockclimbing. The reward, though, was a great view of the canyon and a perfect spot to relax and really soak in the atmosphere. Just as we were making our way out there we suddenly heard a voice behind us call out; "Hey, that looks like a nice place for a couch!" We looked at each other, wondering who in the world that could be, thinking that nobody would know about our couch. Looking back, though, we saw a couple that we'd just met at another lookout point down the road where we'd dragged out the couch to get a picture with the canyon in the background. They had passed by and had come over to hear what we were doing and had taken our picture on the couch. So seeing us climbing across rocks on our way out into the canyon they suggested another couch picture. Not quite feasible, we decided, but fun to be recognized like that, even by someone we'd just met.

Later on, just as we were about to head back, we met a guy named Marcos who also made his way out onto the cliff. He was studying photography at the University of Colorado in Boulder but had come to Flagstaff, AZ, to see about transferring to the University of Northern Arizona to complete his studies. On his way there he wanted to see and photograph the Grand Canyon. After marvelling at the colors of sunset across the canyon and photographing it from every angle he showed us how to play with the exposure settings on our camera and created a couple of psychedelic pictures of us jumping up and down in front of the canyon, blurring the picture to capture the motion in a still frame.

After hanging out with Marcos on the cliff for quite some time we headed back down the cliff and back to our car. Since all three of us were hungry for dinner we trailed Marcos back out of the park and drove back along the way we'd come earlier in the day to the small town of Cameron where we had dinner together in the dining room of the 'Cameron Trading Post' (it seems like every convenience store or gas station out here calls itself a 'trading post', doubtlessly in an effort to lure in tourists, but this place actually was a huge store filled with quality indian crafts and jewelry etc.). Dinner was good, and eating real food was a nice break from what we've been surviving on lately.

After exchanging contact information with Marcos we all said goodbye and as he headed back towards Flagstaff we drove back to the Grand Canyon. The campground inside the park was closed down for the night when we arrived, so we drove back to the same viewpoint we'd hung out at earlier and parked illegally in the parking lot overnight so that we could get up early and see the sun rise over the canyon...