TotSW: North Rim of the Grand Canyon

As I planned the trip, the kiddo asked "Are we going to the Grand Canyon?"  It wasn't on the original list of notions (but so many things weren't...) and Chad mentioned that he hadn't ever been to the North Rim, so we found ourselves here:

Actually, if you look at a map and think about where we went, it becomes clear that we *circumnavigated* the Grand Canyon on this trip.  Maybe that is the hidden theme.

On our way in, it was quite cool, given that this area is up above 8000 feet.  The forests and meadows on Route 87 on the way in were just lovely, and quite a contrast to the more desert-like terrain of earlier parts of the trip.

We did note a big swath burnt in the fire some years back.

Instead of starting at the visitor's center like normal people, we opted to head down a side road towards Angel's Window and Cape Royal.  The road snakes its way along the edge of what is essentially an isthmus of land at the edge of the plateau.

A short walk took us to Angel's window.

I liked that you could see the Colorado River through the window, waaaaaaaay down below.

You may have noticed that there were people on the rock above the window.  Of course we had to go look.

 Chad took the opportunity to take lots of pictures.

The distance down is so large as to be a bit unnerving, even for those of us prone to peering off of things.  It's all so big as to not make any sense to the hindbrain.

We found a nice spot for lunch, near the Cape Royal wedding site.

After lunch, we looked at more views.

The big dropoffs were such that the kid wanted a hand to hold.

I got said kid out towards this lip, but at a certain point, there was flat-out refusal to go any further.  Too creepy, apparently.

More big views.  Somewhere in here, we stopped at Roosevelt point for another short hike, and then headed over to the visitor's center and Bright Angel Point.

Definitely near the visitor's center.

Chad the mountain goat, near the gnarled pine.  It seems the air was pretty clear the day we were there; those blue peaks in the distance are about a hundred miles away.

The trail out to Bright Angel Point is civilized.  Not surprising, as it heads out to the edge straight from the big Grand Canyon Lodge on the North Rim.

I scrambled up a small hummock of rock above the point.  Despite the fact that this small outcrop was an easy scramble and had a big flat top, it was remarkably hard to make myself stand up on top -- the drop to the canyon bottom was so large as to really confuse my sense of balance.

Bright Angel Point.  Ha ha.

From my outcrop, I could see Chad and the kiddo at the "official" viewpoint below.

We found a friendly soul to take a picture of the three of us.

On our way back, we noticed this pair taking pictures with their small Buddha.  They were driving across the country with Buddha, taking comemorative pictures along the way.

We got a clear view of the mountains to the south of the Grand Canyon.  The peak on the left is Humphrey's Peak, which we saw back in Flagstaff.

Closer look at Humphrey's Peak, still with snow on top.

If you don't believe me, the magic app on my phone confirmed it.

Back at the lodge, we admired the compass rose in the pavement, stopped in the store to buy camping fuel and postcards, 

and admired the shiny old cars in the parking lot.  There must have been some sort of event, as the near parking lot was full of these.

Our campsite for the night was back in a forest campground just north of the park boundary.  By this point, the kid was proficient at helping put the tent up so had time to run amok and read while we got dinner ready.  You might notice the larger amount of insulation on us at this point -- at almost 9000 feet, it was chilly.  The forecast was for temperatures to drop to around freezing that night.  Very different conditions than most of the rest of the trip!

While I prepped dinner, Chad amused himself by rigging up a balance and doing careful measurements and calculations regarding our near-empty fuel canister,

the upshot of which is that the canister was almost empty.  We knew that -- that's why we picked up a spare in the camp store earlier!  One has to amuse oneself somehow.

Dinner with warm beverages followed, and we were able to watch the stars come out as darkness fell.  Another fine day; what follows is the long drive home.