Quite Grand Indeed

After a long drive from Mesa Verde to the Grand Canyon, with several stops along the way, we woke up on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon at the North Rim Campground. For both of us, this was our first time at the Grand Canyon, and we have both agreed that it will not be our last. We decided to go to the North Rim instead of the South Rim because the North Rim only gets a small fraction of the visitors compared to the South Rim. We hope next time we can experience the South Rim too, but we were more than content with our adventures on the North Rim.

With the heat quickly rolling in, we headed down the canyon on the Kaibab Trail. Although we would have loved to hike the full rim to rim trail, it was not for this trip. Instead we got just a taste of the canyon, going about 3 miles in before turning around to hike the 2000-3000 feet back to the rim. The colors drastically changed from browns and greens to vibrant reds and oranges, not at all what we had expected.

We reluctantly turned around at the first bridge, Redwall Bridge, to begin the climb back to the rim. In the two days we were at the Grand Canyon, it happened to be that Wilson’s mom and her friend were also at the Grand Canyon, running rim to rim. We got to see them on the Kaibab trail that morning and enjoyed the rest of the day with them. Once saying goodbye we headed out of the park to the surrounding Kaibab National Forest where we found one of the most epic campsites of the road trip. We disperse camped along the rim, making sure to take full advantage of the views, at both sunrise and sunset.

The forest roads in the Kaibab National Forest are a complete maze, it was miracle we were able to get to our campsite! When we headed back toward the park in the morning, we found a fire lookout tower off the road. Raising 125 feet, Wilson and I decided to take the stairs to the top and lookout over the forest.

Back in the park we decided to drive out to Cape Royal, stopping along the way at Roosevelt Point and Vista Encarda.

We then walked along the Cape Royal “trail”, a paved flat path to several overlooks of the canyon and Angels Window. Along the way we took in the views and hung out on the edge for a bit.

Our last night in the Grand Canyon area we camped about an hour away at Jacobs Lake Campground. We enjoyed a relaxing evening and made some of the best quesadillas over our fire!