North Rim

The magic of an outdoors weekend began Thursday night -- indoors, ironically -- at the Grand Canyon Lodge.  Having just arrived at the North Rim after a long day's drive from the Vegas airport, I was milling about with other guests in the sun room as the twilight deepened, enjoying a panoramic view of the canyon.  An historic piano, dating back to the lodge's early years, sat in the room with a "Display Only" sign on it.  Disregarding the sign without batting an eye, a scrawny kid -- very early teens in a ratty t-shirt and shorts, hair in his eyes -- plunked a few notes, and then dragged a chair over.  I was about to move outside to escape the inevitable "Chopsticks." 

But I froze in place as, from memory, the kid lit into the entire final movement from Beethoven's Pathétique Sonata.

The magic ended yesterday with a thud at the Las Vegas airport, where I was forced to hang out for eight hours surrounded by slot machines, as lightning storms delayed all flights.  I arrived home after 1 a.m. last night.

From the sublime to the frustrating.  But in between, happily, almost everything else was sublime.

The North Rim is remote, which is why it gets only ten percent of the park's visitors.  Six hours from Las Vegas, where I rented a car, by way of Zion National Park.  (Coming home, I discovered that the alternative route, by-passing Zion through the Kaibab Paiute Indian Reservation, is about an hour faster.)  Although the North Rim is only about seven miles "as the condor flies" from the South, it's a five hour drive by car or a twenty mile hike by trail.  The North Rim, at well over eight thousand feet, is about a thousand feet higher than the South -- and consequently cooler, greener, and more heavily forested.

Because of the travel time, I had only two full days -- Friday and Saturday -- at the park.  Friday, I spent exploring the lodge and its environs, walking a couple of trails that connected the lodge with a campground and general store a mile and a half away, driving three miles to Point Imperial (highest point on either rim at 8,803 ft.), and in general letting my body acclimate to elevations in the 8,000's.  The big event came the following day -- the descent into the canyon along the North Kaibab trail.

The North Kaibab runs from a point (8,250 ft.) about 1½ miles from the lodge down to the Colorado river at Phantom Ranch, 14 miles away.  Avid followers of my self-puffery will recall that a couple of years ago, I descended from the South Rim to the Colorado (to a point near, but not quite at, Phantom Ranch).  But that was a round trip of only 15 miles, not 28.  And that was in April -- snowy at the top, and maybe 70 at the river.  In August, the temperatures are about 75 at the top and close to 110 at the river.  Let me assure skeptics -- temperature does make a difference.  A big difference.

And so I decided to hike down only as far as Roaring Springs (5,200 ft.), about three thousand feet below the rim, and 9.4 miles round trip by trail.  Ground water percolates through successive layers of water-permeable sandstone and limestone until it reaches the layer of impermeable Bright Angel shale.  Unable to soak in any deeper, it pours out the side of the canyon as a large waterfall (several waterfalls, actually), dropping to Roaring Springs at the base of the Bright Angel shale stratum.  The strength of the falls, in such a dry canyon, is impressive.

The Park Service recommends that anyone doing a day hike to Roaring Springs begin no later than 6 a.m.  I fumbled around, grabbing a fast coffee and danish at the Saloon (opening at 5:30 a.m. as a coffee house), and driving to the parking lot 1.7 miles away.  I'd been told that the parking lot fills early, and I might have to walk from the lodge.  It was virtually empty.  I was on the North Kaibab trail at 6:20 a.m., and had the trail almost to myself all the way down.

The falls were impressive, as I've mentioned, and even more impressive was the hike back up as the sun rose ever higher in the sky.  I met many hikers on their way to Roaring Springs as I climbed back up, sleepy-heads who obviously hadn't hit the trail until near 9 a.m.  I pity them.  Under normal thermal conditions, the hike up would not be difficult, certainly not much more difficult than the Bright Angel trail between the South Rim and Indian Gardens -- but in August, the heat made it a killer.  Especially, that last mile from the top, after the Supai Tunnel.

I found myself resting and sipping water every few hundred yards, and I usually consume less water while hiking than do most.  I felt quite fatigued by the time I dragged myself up to the Rim.  One consolation for anyone planning to repeat my experience in August is that piped spring water is available at both Roaring Springs and the Supai Tunnel (1.7 miles from the top).  I did fine on the two liters of water I was carrying, even without reliance on these sources on the trail.

Total round trip time -- just over five hours.

Good dinners at the lodge, relaxation and reading on the lodge's terrace (where friendly waiters happily refresh your beer glass), people-watching (I could write a separate essay on the varieties of Americans and foreigners who gravitate to the North Rim), and, in general, a long, magical weekend.

The magic enhanced, of course, by my sense of accomplishment -- Roaring Springs in August!  (But I talked to enough fellow hikers, with greater ambitions, to give me a real hankering for what appears to be a very feasible Rim to Rim backpacking trip.  Some day in the future.  Maybe?)