Road Trip Travel Log 05.10.25

Road Trip Travel Log 05.10.25

On our first day in Grand Canyon we did a family hike along the canyon rim, west from the Yavapai Museum of Geology to the El Tovar hotel, a little over one and a half miles. It’s not a very long hike, but a good bit longer than we’d ever done before at the canyon. On our previous trips we’d visited in July and August with temps in the mid-90s. Coming from Dallas we’re used to the heat, but not so much the elevation. As it was, visiting in early May we had beautiful weather, it never getting above the low 80s at the hottest time of the day. The kids are all older now, too, and made short work of this easy and incredibly gorgeous hike. Kassi and I lagged behind, taking photos and enjoying the scenery.

The museum was about what you’d expect, with a number of hands on exhibits explaining the formation of the canyon, 3D relief maps, educational videos, and a gift shop. I’ve heard the formation of the canyon explained many times; they always deliver it with the zeal of Al Gore trying to explain climate change in An Inconvenient Truth. Personally, I’ve never been 100% sold on the conventional explanation. So much of it just defies common sense. One video I watched showed a river carving a snaking path along a flat valley when it decides suddenly to bore a hole at a downward 90 degree angle through solid rock. No explanation was provided. Another video explained how sediment was deposited by the river, building up the land, and then washed away again in a continuous cycle. But the rock layers visible along the sides of the canyon were said to demonstrate the existence of sediment the video just claimed had all been washed away by erosion. I didn’t get it. Maybe they just did a bad job of explaining it.

Right outside the museum is a paved path that winds along the canyon rim all the way to Grand Canyon Village. Called the Trail of Time, it attempts to translate the two billion year natural history of the canyon into physical distance along the trail, each step you take representing some ungodly amount of time in the formation of the canyon.

On display along the sides of the path are little geological exhibits in the form of rock samples that show you the different kinds of rock deposited in the canyon during the historical historical epoch signified by the total distance you’ve walked from the start of the trail to that point. Got it? I feel like that was an awkward explanation.

You can walk right up to the side of the canyon, but they recommend you stick to the path. A lot of folks have died in the canyon from lack of attention and carelessness. Selfies can in fact be fatal. That bit doesn’t concern me too much, as I’m generally pretty careful with the camera, but I’ve heard that chunks of the rim will occasionally crumble off into the canyon, which is kind of a nightmare of mine.

That little trail down there in the distance leads to an overlook above the Colorado River. I’ve wanted to walk that trail since the first time I photographed it several years ago. This November in a few weeks Kassi and I may get the chance. Depends if our legs are holding out by that point. It is many miles along the trail, and several miles down, with just as much height to recover on the way back up.

I remember seeing over the rim of the canyon for the first time. It took my breath away. it doesn’t look real; more like a painting. And the sheer scale of it. Your brain has a hard time wrapping its, uh, head around it. Or something like that.

If the Colorado river did all that, it is strange to think that practically anywhere, the flattest and most boring of landscapes, has the potential to be a Grand Canyon given enough time and enough corrosive water action.

At a certain point along the trail we stopped because we could see people in the distance descending and ascending along South Kaibab trail.

I caught a guy out there with his girlfriend taking selfies out on Cedar Ridge near Skeleton Point. They spent a little while there, peeking over the side and taking the place in. I don’t know why, but it made me wonder what it would be like to be out there at that particular spot at night. The sky views must be fantastic.

The route we plan to take is around 13 miles or so, roughly divided into thirds — the walk down Bright Angel Trail, then west along the flat Tonto Trail, and then back up Bright Angel Trail, which comes out on Grand Canyon Village. We’re planning to take around 4 liters of water and some homemade heavily fortified portable meals. And plenty of Advil.

Another way to do it is on a mule. I have mixed feelings about the mules, because although they are great to photograph they litter the trail up with dung. I imagine that in the old west, you were constantly confronted with that smell all the time. And a lot of others, I suppose. Funny to think how much of life must have stank.

This is Bright Angel trail, the route we’ll take back up to the canyon rim. Supposedly, it’s not as steep as South Kaibab, but you really couldn’t tell that from the looks of it.

It truly is one of my favorite places in the world. Absolute craploads of majesty.

When we finally arrived at the El Tovar we found the kids bored and tired. They’d beaten us there by around 40 minutes or so. I might do a separate post on the El Tovar itself, as its a grand old place. I love all those thick black beams. Very solid and comforting. Dinners there have always been exquisite, and you see people from all around the world. You can overhear conversations in many languages. The ones from Europe, though, you can generally tell right off because they tend to dress more nicely than us. This year I counted 6 or 8 languages I could identify, but French was the most prevalent.

This is just a gratuitous shot I grabbed in the parking lot as we were about to set out back to our rented cabin by way of Tusayan, the little town right outside the park entrance. Raven on a raven.

The whole time we were out west we were blessed with gorgeous weather, as pleasant as we could have asked for. Quite different from the last time we were at the Canyon, where we had to deal with serious rain almost the entire time. Made for an interesting trip, though.

After watching the IMAX film that plays there year-round at the Grand Canyon Visitor Center we dropped by The Grand Canyon Chocolate Factory, a little chocolate shop in Tusayan that Lu was keen to hit. To be honest it was a little less than I’d imagined, but worth the stop. I had an ice cream float that was very refreshing as we stood outside and watched the sun set.

Next: Kassi and dip our toes below the rim with a short morning hike out to Ooh Aah Point. Some beautiful scenes at dawn (more or less).