White Pocket (06-20-22)

 

Driving around this area of Arizona, you can’t help but notice the Vermillion cliffs.  Every time we turned our heads, they were there. So much so, that I barely thought to get  a decent picture of them.

This area is known for its beautiful, colorful, rock formations.

Many of the hikes here require a permit, and one hike, called The Wave can only be hiked if you literally win the lottery to do so. Visitation is very limited. (this is the Wave, but not my picture)

But not ALL the hikes require permit- White Pocket is open to anyone- anyone who can get there, that is.

White Pocket is just one of the sandstone rock formations in the Vermillion Cliffs National Monument. This is one outing that required some preparation on our part. Since these rock formations are out in the middle of nowhere, I downloaded the map for offline use. I was still a little unsure that we had the right route.

The night before our drive, we found a place to camp that was as close to White Pocket as we felt we could get in the camper. 

In order to drive this route, you have to have a 4 wheel drive high clearance vehicle -

They take it pretty seriously, and want to make sure you know what they mean.

After airing the Jeep tires down to 20 PSI, we were on our way. My fears of getting lost in the desert were put to bed by the signs we encountered along the way.

The first few miles were on a pretty easy gravel road, but soon enough we encountered the "interesting" part.

We would go through patches of soft sand, sometimes deep enough to hit the undercarriage on the Jeep. It was a little like driving in snow...you have to go at the right speed, and stopping is not an option.

There were other sections that were more solid- those are the areas that high clearance was required.

We didn’t see any other vehicles on the way there, which was a little nerve-wracking for me because I assumed if we had trouble, there would be other rigs on the road.

Just when we thought we were there, the road was the worst we had encountered, with deep sand that had the driver saying “ oh crap”. 

Once we got to the parking lot, we did see several other vehicles parked there.

After a short hike down a deep sandy path, we found out why it was all worth it. This is what we saw…

The Grand Canyon-North Rim (06-18-22)

 Most people who visit the grand canyon visit the south rim- it has more view points, amenities, and is accessible more of the year. The north rim sits at a higher elevation and it gets a lot more snow than the south rim. It's also a lot cooler, and that’s what we were looking for.

We stopped at the nearby Kaibab National Forest visitor center and spoke to a volunteer about good places near the park for dispersed camping. Armed with some great suggestions we took off for the east rim.

About 6 miles down a dirt road we found the perfect spot. Enough sun for solar, level ground, and a perk- using our cell signal booster, we had decent data speeds to use our electronics.

The view from our chairs was amazing.

The north rim has a smaller visitor center than the south rim, but we checked it out.  I had forgotten my hat (rare for me) so we went into the gift shop to see if I could find something decent. I have always wanted a hat from a national park- but for the most part they are “ranger” green- kinda boring.  Lucky for me I found one that wasn’t!

We did some short hikes in that area since we were there. Bright Angel Point is a short walk to a popular viewpoint, so we joined the throngs of people on the trail.

Back at the rig, we made some tentative plans for what we wanted to see and do.

Our first full day we drove back to the visitor center to hike 3 miles of the Trancept Trail. There are, for the most part, two types of trails in this park. Those that go down into the canyon, and those that go along the rim. Temperatures in the canyon are over 100 right now, so we stuck to the rim trails.

After our 3 mile hike, we had more time so we decided to drive to one of the viewpoints that was on our list for the following day.

You start to wonder after a while, just how many different viewpoints do you need to see? The view doesn't change that much.

That being said, Point Imperial was one of the better views, in my opinion. I am glad we made the effort to get there.

Day two we drove the scenic Cape Royal Drive. There are hikes and viewponts along the way but we decided we'd better do the hike first, or we might get lazy. 

This hike, Cape Final was about 4 miles round trip to a pretty nice viewpoint.

Done with our hike, we stopped at a picnic area and ate our lunch, and drove to the end of the road- Angels Window Viewpoint.  There are 3 pictures of this…

the one we took looking at Angels Window (note the hole in the rock),

the one we took walking out onto that rock….

and the view from that rock. What was neat about this spot is that you  could clearly see the Colorado River deep in the canyon.

We honestly decided to skip most of the other “viewpoints” along the road.

After a day off, where we just went for a walk down the road and hung around the camper, our final day we hiked part of the Widforss Trail.

It is named for a gentleman who was known for his paintings of the park.  The actual trail is 10 miles- we did half of it. This is one of those trails that we call “good exercise”.  Although it was along the rim, we were mostly hiking in the woods, with occasional glimpses of the canyon.  Had we done the whole trail I am sure the view would have been spectacular- but we aren’t up for a 10 mile hike yet. 

Destination: The Grand Canyon (06-16-22)

 Our first destination is The North Rim of the Grand Canyon.

We have been trying to get to the north rim  for years but something has always gotten in the way. This year, we finally got there- but of course we had to make a few stops along the way.

We left Havasu late in the morning, on June 7th, but we knew our first stop would be Williams AZ, and its only 3 hours from us. Williams is much cooler than Havasu, which is great, because it was 105* when we left town.

There is plenty of Federal land for free camping in the Williams area, so we picked a spot and set up camp for one night.

We were originally going to travel in the Mobile Suite this summer but basically At the last minute decided to switch to the truck camper. Our destinations are up in the air and we aren't sure how the summer will go, which makes it easier to travel in the camper.

Williams is a really cool town, the gateway to the Grand Canyon, with interesting shopping, restaurants, and lots of cowboy stuff. Paul called around and found someone who could re-shape the straw Stetson hat he got from his father.

Buck Williams was the name we got, so off we went to see him. Buck is an old timer who loves to tell stories. He and his wife settled in Williams because he thought it would be cool to live in a town that had the same name as him.

Buck likes to chat, and spent the first few minutes talking about what a hat can tell you about a person. For example, this hat says the owner is Confederate, military, what branch of the military, right handed, lives in an area that gets rain and snow and a bunch of other things.

After chatting for a bit, we left with Paul's hat properly shaped and the information on how to keep it that way (never lay it down on the brim).

We wanted one of our stops on the way to the north rim to be White Pocket Canyon in the Vermillion Cliffs National Monument in northern Arizona, but before we went there, there was a hike I wanted to do near Lees Ferry, which was on the way. Unfortunately Lees Ferry was a step in the wrong direction in terms of weather. It was 106, and the campground there has no hook up. But, still we went.

After setting up, we left to explore and started with the indoor visitor center at the nearby Navajo Bridge, a bridge that crosses the Colorado River. The original bridge was built in 1929, and was the only bridge that crossed the Colorado River for 600 miles.  Its completion  was hailed as the biggest news in southwest history. When the new one was built 67 years later, some of the same methods were used.

Far below the bridges is the Colorado River.

Once we ran out of things to look at we headed back to camp to get our swimsuits. Just across the road from the campground is a small beach area on the Colorado River. The water was awesome, although frigid enough that Paul didn't go in.

Very early the next morning we were up and on the move to Cathedral Wash, the hike I wanted to do. This is a 4 mile hike that leads through a wash to the river. I didn't know much about the trail other than a lot of people said it was fun and sometimes you had to figure out where to put your feet.

Once we got thru the easy part and arrived at the "technical " section, my confidence waivered. For most of the trail you aren't walking in the bottom of the wash, you are walking along the ledges above it.  You can see my pink shirt in this picture.

Some were very narrow, some were pretty high up. And when we ran out of ledge on one side we had to cross the wash and walk on the ledge on the other side.

There were several times I sent Paul ahead to find the best route, or let me know if he didn't think I would be able to do it (but he never says that).

Luckily there were cairns marking the trail, and they were very helpful. Some were definitely on the small side, lol but they served their purpose.

Despite my wanting to turn back at least a half dozen times, we did make it to the river. It was already hot by the time we got there at 8:30 am, so I dunked my hat and shirt into the water before we started the trek back. It helped a lot- it was 93* by the time we got off the trail. (Thanks for the idea, Brad)

Since we were so close to Page, AZ,  we decided to go from the frying pan into the fire weather wise. Paul wanted to see Lake Powell, and all the differences in the lake from when he used to boat there.

Coming from immense heat we were happy to find a spot at the Elks lodge in Page . It has electric hook up, so we could shelter in the rig when it was really hot.

We spent the afternoon driving around in the air conditioned Jeep, stopping at some of the viewpoints overlooking the lake. Paul was saddened by the low level of the water.

By comparison, this is what it looked like years ago….

After touring the GLEN CANYON DAM visitor center, however, I was interested to learn that the Lake, although low, is not at a Record Low. It was lower in 1969. Yes, a long time ago, but part of the purpose of the dam was to create Lake Powell as a storage basin for times of drought- and that's exactly what it's doing. It's storing the water so that people living downstream do not run out.

That’s the upside- the downside is that lake Powell is 163 feet below full pool.  If the water level goes down 35 more feet, they will be unable to generate electricity-which will affect millions of consumers.

[As a side note here, I have been amazed at how little thought residents of the desert, like those of us in Havasu, give to water, and the conservation of it. I myself try to pay attention, but I am sure I don't do near enough to conserve such a precious commodity. I am not sure what the answer is, but I am thinking that Americans are all about their pocketbook, so maybe increasing the price of water use is our best solution. Rant over]

Continuing our trend of getting up very early in the morning, the next day we got up and did the 1.5 mile walk to the iconic Horseshoe Bend.

And THEN we made it to the north rim.