Parks and Trekreation Day 2

(Original post date - April 14, 2016)

#parksandtrekreation
#katieandkristagowest

Day 2 - March 25, 2016

Grand Canyon - South Rim
Horseshoe Bend
Lake Powell

After waking up in the middle of the night to shut off the heater which was trying to suffocate me to death, we officially awoke at 5:00am (yet again), quickly packed our belongings and drove about 30 minutes to the south rim of the Grand Canyon in hopes of watching the sun rise. We followed a few other cars through the park entrance which was unmanned at that hour.
Note: Krista and I had previously purchased an annual pass which gives you entry into all the national parks ($80), but if you don’t want to pay the entrance fee, just get there before the crack of dawn and you can sail on through.

We parked at the visitor’s center and followed the people to Mather’s Point. I guess we weren’t the only ones who had the idea to watch the sun rise over the Grand Canyon.

It was freezing so I was wearing fleece leggings underneath my hiking pants, many layers on my torso including a snowboarding jacket, and mittens. Even with all that my fingers were frozen as I tried to take pictures with my new Nikon D5300, a camera that I am just learning to use. A lot of time on this trip was spent adjusting settings. I’ll get the hang of it soon. I hope.

I did offer to let Krista take turns with my mittens since she failed to bring any with her on this trip even though it was definitely on our packing list. But she stubbornly refused every single time I offered.

Before we embarked on this epic trip I figured a selfie stick would come in handy and it did! After I played around with my real camera, we took out the selfie stick and got a couple shots in front of the grandest canyon. #sogrand

Once the sun started to show its face and was officially up, it was extremely bright. Who knew?

We got back in the car and once our fingers regained the ability to move, we made peanut butter sandwiches and ate an apple for breakfast. Then we made our way to what I thought was Bright Angel Trailhead and I said “here we are!” but it turned out to be the other side of the Visitor’s Center parking lot. Whatever. I’ve never been here! Thanks to Google Maps we were finally able to find the right place, but not without panicking a little as we tried to navigate the Grand Canyon Village and look for parking. But soon enough we found a spot, loaded up our flash packs with water and snacks (and the selfie stick) and found ourselves right near the trailhead where a nice older man asked us if it was our first time. How could he tell?

We began descending into the canyon and my first words to Krista were “make sure not to get too close to the edge” as images of falling to my death swirled around in my head. But once we got going I became more comfortable. In fact, it was a wide path that was very well maintained (a trend we saw at every park we explored). Shout out to the National Park Service and Bureau of Land Management!

Another trend was being greeted by friendly hikers with a “hello” or a “good morning” as we passed. So kumbaya. And at first, Krista and I would give each other a look every time it happened but as the trip progressed, we too started initiating the hellos and the good mornings. Every so often, we would move to the side to let other hikers pass since we were busy taking so many pictures and just repeating ourselves like broken records how “beautiful” our surroundings were. There’s something about this majestic part of the world that reduces my vocabulary to dust.

So we hiked down to the 1.5 mile rest house, which was a breeze. It took us about 45 minutes. We sat on a rock and just marveled silently, wishing we had a cup of coffee to go along with the view. But after several minutes it was time to make our way back up. Mostly everyone in the canyon seemed like reasonable people and families, but one girl daringly (and stupidly if you ask me) went past the “Do Not Enter - Dangerous Overlook” sign and balanced on the edge of the canyon in the yoga Tree pose. We were too angry at her to continue looking and moved on. At one point we had to move aside to let some people on mules pass us and I told the guide that I “liked his chaps or whatever” and he said “they’re batwings!” Ok. Good to know. I like your batwings.

Supposedly it takes twice as long to get back up to the top because of how steep it is, but because we stopped to take so many pictures on the way down and not as many on the way back up, it was about the same amount of time, though we were huffing and puffing all the way up. My Fitbit was like…sorry I’m not gonna tell you what your heart rate is cause you’re too sweaty or something.

Once at the top, we rewarded ourselves with an Epic Bar, and headed to our next destination: Horseshoe Bend, which is the east rim of the canyon. Two and a half hours later we arrived and  decided to eat at the Jack-in-the-Box in Page, AZ. And after we were disgustingly full of more fast food we parked on the road with all the other cars at Horseshoe Bend. To get to the big reveal, it was about a 15 minute walk, if that. It was beyond amazing and terrifying at the same time. There was no barrier or railing and as Krista walked closer and closer to the edge I loudly ordered her to “go no further!”

It was so windy that sand was being whipped into our faces at a terrific speed. (Idea: Go to Horseshoe Bend for a free microderm abrasion treatment.)

Once the wind calmed down a bit, I fearfully gripped my iPhone with all the strength I had in my sweaty fingers to take my own version of this iconic spot. (No Aunt Joanie, I did not steal this from the internet!)

After we’d had enough of this heart-pounding place, we drove on. On the way to our first camp site, Lake Powell, we saw other cars stopped on the road to have a look at a dam. So we followed suit.

Krista: “Do you know how a dam works?”
Me: “No I don’t. Damn.”

Then Krista got the bright idea to balance on a guard rail post on the side of the highway to take a selfie. We hugged tightly and got this before jumping/almost falling off:

Lake Powell is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Surprise surprise. Another “beautiful” place. We drove our rental car over the sand to our perfect spot to camp. A spot on the beach with a clear view. We wrestled with the tent in the wind and blowing sand which was steadily accumulating inside, but finally managed to get it secured and virtually sand free.

We took a walk, and some slow motion videos of ourselves running down the beach, and then asked some strangers what time it was. It’s very confusing on this new land we’ve staked due to daylight savings issues.

Much to our dismay upon returning to the tent, we found it full of sand again. It is what it is. So we began cooking our first “camp meal,” Mesquite BBQ chicken with rice and beans which ended up being more like chili. The way you make these meals is to boil water in your JetBoil, pour it into the bag of dehydrated food, stir it, zip it up and wait the appropriate amount of time, which we patiently did. Even though the rice wasn’t cooked all the way, it was flavorful and filling.

After dinner we had the thrilling idea to make popcorn, but realizing we didn’t have any oil to put in the adorable pot we borrowed from Mike, we scrapped that idea and made hot chocolate and watched as the remaining daylight faded instead. It was beautiful and majestic and otherworldly.

As we had been holding our pee since we arrived at Lake Powell, we figured we’d better make a potty run to get ready for bed. Thankfully there was a real toilet with plenty of toilet paper nearby. Then we brushed our teeth by the bushes near the tent with water from our Nalgene bottle and hopped into our tent which we had set up on a slope for some crazy reason. Oh yeah. So we could have a nice view. So we snuggled into our uneven tent with our sleeping bags and sleeping pads and the still assembled JetBoil with the gas attached because we were too afraid to take it apart (Mike later informed us that the hissing gas sound we were hearing was just residual gas and would not blow us up as we unscrewed it. Well now we know!)

So we slept like inchworms in a constant battle to not get smushed into the bottom of the tent. We woke up multiple times and had to re-adjust, but as Krista got a call earlier in the evening letting her know she was approved to move in to a brand new studio starting in June, she was able to rest easy knowing she will soon be sleeping in one of the coolest buildings in Long Island City.

But #ourtentisfullofsand