Grand Canyon National Park

Almost our last stop before heading home was the Grand Canyon. We only saw the South Rim of the Canyon. The north rim was still closed for the winter. At 7000 feet (2100 m) elevation it was still winter at the canyon, very cold and snow still on the ground. In spite of that it was very busy. This photo was taken from the Hermit's Point Road on the west side of the south rim, a road that tomorrow will be closed to cars. It was taken at one of the viewpoints along the road at a spot known as The Abyss and shows the Colorado River at the bottom of the canyon on the right. I had not seen the canyon since I was 13 years old and my wife had never seen it, so it was great to have been there, though our stay was only two days and two nights.

This photo was taken late in the day from Mohave Point along the South Rim trail at Grand Canyon National Park. It was still winter in the canyon and we stayed only part of day and cancelled our plans to hike down into the canyon, waking to very low temperatures and snow the following day.

This was the South Rim trail between Hopi Point and Mohave Point. We visited the Grand Canyon for part of a day while traveling in California and Arizona, but the winter weather at Grand Canyon defeated us.

Toward the end of our recent trip we visited the Grand Canyon but were not there as long as we had planned. We arrived in the afternoon and hiked the South Rim trail as far as the Abyss. It was cold and windy but we had a nice hike and intended to hike down into the canyon the next day via the South Kaibab trail. We camped in the park that night but woke up the next morning to six inches (15 cm) of snow and 17 F (-8 C) temperatures. We decided to go on and drove to Death Valley instead. The photo is from Grand Canyon National Park near Hopi Point with the Red Wall in the foreground and the Colorado River just visible on the left of the photo. We were on the South Rim trail, a trail that follows the edge of the canyon from the South Kaibab trailhead to Hermit's Rest, a total of thirteen miles. The photo, I think, catches some of the amazing colors of the canyon which are always changing with the light and the weather.

Maricopa Point is on the south rim of the Grand Canyon along the road to Hermit's Rest.

We were in Grand Canyon National Park two years in a row. This was the sunset from Hopi Point on thee South Rim when we were there last year.

We are home again after driving straight through from Michigan to Washington, a total of 2000 miles (3200 km). We left Thursday evening and arrived home last night about 10:00 pm. We were in ten different states and through three different time zones. The photos are from last year's visit to Grand Canyon National Park when we hiked part of the South Kaibab trail and saw the mules they use to bring tourists and supplies to the bottom of the canyon. We only hiked a part of the trail, however. This year when we were back to Grand Canyon we intended to hike the whole trail but were prevented by snow and ice, so hiking to the bottom of the canyon is still on our list of things to do and we will have to visit the park again, perhaps in the autumn.

The South Kiabab trail is one of the trails that leads down to the bottom of the Grand Canyon from the South Rim. We hiked part of the trail last year.

We had hoped on our recent visit to Grand Canyon National Park to hike the South Kaibab trail to the bottom of the canyon but were prevented by a winter storm. This was the South Kaibab trail when we hiked part of it last year.