Life is "Grand"!

 As you can imagine, Terry has been doing the heavy lifting in making sure that our adventures  have been documented in this blog.  After our latest chapter, hiking the Grand Canyon, she asked me to take a greater role in writing this entry.  Considering the fact that she finished the 28+ mile hike despite almost passing out twice, how could I say no? (*Terry says this is exaggerated)

What does this mean to the faithful followers of the blog?  This entry will probably be heavy on the hyperbole and light on the facts(what do you expect from me?), and I'm going to write it in first person from my perspective. 

We headed to  Grand Canyon National Park on Wednesday without permits to hike below the rim, so we hit the road at 6:00 in the morning in order to get a good place in line at the back country permit office.  A few first come, first serve permits are offered every day, and if we were able to score one, our plan was to hike 14 miles to the bottom of the canyon at Phantom Ranch (Bright Angel Campground)  on Thursday,  hike 7 miles back up to the Cottonwood Campground on Friday, then hike the remaining 7 miles back to the rim on Saturday.  To make a long story short, our early start earned us the permits that we wanted (were afraid?) to get. We were ready to tackle the North Kaibab Trail.

We went to the north rim, as it was closer to us and we liked the remote nature of it.  The south rim is very busy, more commercial, and a lot farther from us.  The first picture was taken during our Wednesday driving tour of the north rim.  We also visited some old Indian ruins on the north rim. These are the remains of some ancient pueblos used for summer homes.

We spent time on the front porch of the lodge at the north rim, and then enjoyed a great pasta dinner in the dining room. We packed up the gear we would need for the hike and went to bed early in our little cabin.

One LITTLE(?) glitch with that packing of gear? Count the hiking boots in the trunk. One, two, three....three. Hmmm. Perhaps someone would like to hop in and out of the canyon? (That someone would be Glen by the way)  Luckily we had put in our trail sneakers as well as most of the boots. Glen decided he would have to go with shoe choice number two. 

Thursday Morning -- up at 4:00 in the morning to get an early start in order to avoid the heat that we knew would be a factor at the bottom of the canyon.  The lower down you go, the hotter the canyon gets, with 100+ degree temperatures projected for Phantom Ranch, our day's destination.  I was able to take several pictures, even though I was working hard to keep up with Terry on the downslope.  She won't admit it, but I think she enjoys making me work on the downs.

It's time to throw in a few facts that will be meaningful to those of you who have done some hiking.  During our 14 mile hike down into the canyon, we lost over one mile of altitude -- 5700 feet .  Of course, since our route was an out and back one, we gained that altitude as well.  More details regarding the steepness of the trail later.  For each step of the 28 mile round-trip trek, we carried full packs; none of that wimpy day-pack stuff.  We didn't take the time to weigh them at the beginning of our hike, but when we weighed them at the end, we found that Terry had been carrying 30 pounds of pack and stuff, and I had been carrying 50 pounds.  I don't know who decided that we needed all of that stuff, but at times I wasn't impressed by their decision making.
We handled the first 7 miles of the hike in 3 hours and reached the Cottonwood Campground; the place that we would be camping on our second night of the journey.  At this point, things were going very well.  The fact that we had been traveling downhill meant that it had been a relatively easy hike to that point.  (If any hike is easy when you're carrying a bunch of extra weight on your backs, that is) 

Another mile into the hike, we actually hit a steep incline.  I noticed that Terry was slowing down a bit, so I called for a drink break.  At that point, I realized that her asthma had kicked in(she hadn't taken her inhaler because of the downward nature of the trail) and that she was actually close to passing out.  Why hadn't she called for a break, you might ask?  Apparently she was tougher than she was smart, which means that she was infringing on my usual territory. We took a break, Terry took a couple of puffs off of her inhaler, and  we were ready to continue on down the trail.

We traveled another few miles  down the trail, and even though it was still mid-morning, the temperature started to take its toll.  It's always a challenge to drink enough water and to keep the electrolyte levels up while hiking, and the downward nature and moderate temperatures early in the hike had lulled us into underestimating our fluid replacement needs.  To put it politely, Terry uses up a lot of fluid when she hikes, and while neither of us had had enough to drink, it hit her harder than it hit me.  On one of our rest breaks, I noticed that she wasn't sweating much any more. For her, not sweating much means that her body is dangerously close to the condition of heat exhaustion.  We used to use the saying, "No sweat man," to mean no worries, everything was fine.  In hiking,  this saying means that the body is in the process of shutting down in protest of the exercise and heat combination. 

We had passed beyond the point of no return, as we were closer to our destination than we were to the campground that we had passed through a few miles before.  All of a sudden, our recreational hike started to take on the flavor of an exercise in survival.  We decided to reduce some of the stress on Terry's system by having me leapfrog with her pack for the next section of the trail.  I carried my pack ahead while Terry rested and hydrated, and when I had traveled a ways down the trail, I dropped my pack and hiked back to Terry.  I then carried Terry's pack while she hiked along with me.  A mile or so of this procedure along with intense hydration had Terry sweating again, and reduced my elevated stress level back to normal.  Terry insisted on carrying her pack for the final stretch of the hike, and short of wrestling her for it, I knew that I couldn't keep her from carrying it. 

Phantom Ranch, with the accompanying Bright Angel Campground, was certainly a welcome sight.  We had spent 14 miles and 8+ hours on the trail, and the temperature at the end of our hike was over 100 degrees.   Without guilt, we purchased some souvenirs in the Phantom Ranch store -- you can only purchase those items at the bottom of the Grand Canyon -- and Terry had some of the "world's best tasting lemonade".  We spent the rest of the day hanging out in the stream that passes through the campground, which helped us recover from the stresses of the hike.

We had signed up for the vegetarian chili option for dinner at Phantom ranch. Dinner is served in scheduled time slots, and served family style. We sat at a table with a girl from Switzerland, some young men from the Netherlands, and two Japanese couples. The conversation was lively, and the topics ranged  from our hikes to cycling to lobster.  We learned that it had taken the Japanese couples over 12 hours to make the hike that we had done -- talk about a long day on the trail!

A young family from Mississippi had hiked in from the south rim, and we spent quite a bit of time chatting with them about their trip. It turns out that they had recently been in Glacier National Park, and had taken a raft trip there. The guide in their raft was none other than Maddy Brooke...the daughter of the owners of the St. Mary KOA where we worked in Montana! Small world.

While Friday's hike was "only" 7 miles, it had a solid 1500 foot elevation gain and we were still in recovery mode from the day before.  In order to avoid potential problems with heat, we hit the trail at 5:30.  After 4 hours on the trail we arrived at the Cottonwood Campground, and we quickly set up camp, found shade, and became slugs.  During the day we located a path that lead down to the stream, where people had obviously spent a lot of time and effort in making a nice pool below a small waterfall.  I had been given directions to the pool by another camper who said that I could find my own trail, but "watch out for rattlesnakes".  Needless to say, we used the common trail.

I had carried a backpack stove with some store bought meals with the intention of cooking a hot supper, but it almost didn't happen.  The stove fired up okay, but the flame was yellow and intermittent, and it wouldn't produce enough heat to boil the water.  I hadn't used the stove(other than making sure that it lit) for a couple of years, so I was at a loss to know what to do.  I was within seconds of throwing up my hands and declaring a Cliff Bar supper,  when I looked up and saw the forlorn expression on Terry's face.   I took one more look through the stove's gear and found a tool that I hadn't noticed before.  This was the magic tool, and after I used it to clean a fixture, the stove worked like a charm.  Spaghetti in a bag never tasted so good.

 Saturday's hike was going to present some challenges, so we hit the trail at 4:00 in the morning to take most of the heat out of the  equation.  Packing up via headlamp is always fun, and the little mouse that kept wanting to get in Glen's pack was cute, but not a welcome addition to the pack weight. We left him behind. The hike was 7 miles in length, with an elevation gain of 1000 feet in the first 2 miles.  During the final 5 miles we were climbing over 3000 feet, with an ending elevation of 8200 feet.  This means we were going to battle a combination of fatigue from multiple days on the trail, a serious elevation gain,  and the challenge of exercising at high altitude.  We would also have to hike where the mule rides share the trail. Smelly mule droppings, pee, and sandy trail carved up by hoofprints would add to the fun. For those of you who have encountered any of these challenges, you understand the difficulty of the combination that we were going to encounter.

In a way, Saturday's hike was a bit anti-climactic.  It was a physical and mental challenge,  but it passed without drama.  Yes, once the sun rose we were treated to some amazing scenery -- scenery that we had to earn, which always makes it sweeter.  Yes, we were tired and, at times, just wanted to finish the hike.  We tried to remember to enjoy the journey instead of focusing solely on reaching our destination.   Why do we do things like hike the Grand Canyon?  Maybe it's the sharing of adventure that makes such an experience so special, maybe it's being immersed in one of the world's natural wonders that makes such a journey worth taking, or maybe it's simply an attempt to answer the question "I wonder if  I can ...."



























This last photo is for Ethan D.....we found one in the real size....and are really glad they don't come in the size of that statue Glen was standing beside. While he was not aggressive in any way, we liked him fine in the one foot range.

Moab~Adventure Begins Here

That nifty title is the slogan you see on the billboards approaching Moab, Utah for miles on miles. Moab is famous for biking, jeeping, and has lots of other outdoor activities such as rafting and hiking. It is full of college students working summer jobs as guides, waiters, etc. in hopes that on their off time they can play.(Kind of like teachers traveling to work part time in campgrounds.....) :)

We were excited to visit Moab again for several reasons. 1) We were going to meet up with friends we worked with in Montana     2) We remembered some local restaurants with fondness   3) Arches are just really interesting formations that we don't have in Maine

The drive from Panguitch to Moab was a bit over 4 hours. We just about melted. The drive is through desert, and we traveled it in the heat of the day. Over 100 degrees heat. Terry is pretty whiney about the fact that our tow car (purchased used and as cheap a model as we could find) has no air conditioning.  While this is ok for driving around Maine, and worked ok in Montana, it isn't so ok for Utah in the summer-- according to her.  Glen considered the hot drive conditioning for Moab itself, as the temperatures were scheduled to be above 100 for several days.  If you can't drive in the heat, how can you expect to hike in the heat?   Thank goodness we had the cooler with us stocked with ice and drinks. Maybe that is the secret to living through it. 

As we arrived in Moab, we first made efforts to hook up with our friends--James and Zoe, Kim and Lisa. We had a nice chat in the campground with James and Zoe while waiting for Kim to finish up work.  Then we all went out to dinner at the Moab Brewery. That was one of the fondly remembered restaurants. It was a great evening of catching up, sharing new happenings, and reminiscing about our experiences in Montana.   This brewery has FANTASTIC beers on tap, but they don't bottle any of them.  Glen's plans to bring some back to Maine to share with the guys at a fall campfire quickly fizzled out, but he did, however, sample several different beers so that he could make a complete report when he returns home. 

A bit off the subject of what we are doing....James is an author, and we just finished reading one of his books,Heckel Casey  It is an interesting read with a classic battle of good vs. evil.  He also has some horror stories if that is more your thing....  look up James Hoch.

The next day was one of fun activities that allowed us to avoid the heat. We started with the highlight of the trip--an airplane flight over Canyonlands and Arches National Parks.  Our friend Kim is a pilot who flies rafters back from trips on the Colorado River, as well as tourists looking to see the national parks from the air. He also has his own plane and had some spare time that day. We had our own private tour of the parks from the air. It was amazing! Glen decided that looking down from 7000 feet while seated in an airplane isn't as scary as a 1000 foot drop on a hiking trail.   Here are some photos from that tour.

After the great flight, we decided to head up Castle Creek Canyon to a local winery. Wine is hard to find in Utah. You can't get it in the grocery store. This particular winery was also located at a resort called Red Cliffs Lodge. Here you could ride horses, raft, and do other outdoor activities from a base right on the Colorado River. Because of the location with beautiful red cliffs all around and the river flowing by, many movies have been filmed in the area. There was a small museum dedicated to the films located there and we had fun exploring it.

The dummy of "Thelma" from Thelma and Louise was in the museum along with a lot of old west artifacts, movie posters and photos, costumes, and other memorabilia. Lots of the John Wayne westerns, Indiana Jones, and other movies were filmed in the Moab area. They say one or two movies shoot here every year.  A new movie with Will Smith called After Earth recently finished filming here. And....we got to see lots of the props and sets for the current movie being made there.  There were cool old trains and train cars loaded with ore all loaded on flatbed trucks. We were hoping some director would "discover" us and we would be cast as extras....but alas, it wasn't meant to be. Terry would have made a fine barmaid, and Glen the shopkeeper that gets killed or some other equally impressive roles. We would have had to call up Rich for some pointers on acting. Oh, well. Some other time perhaps. If only we got to see the stars, at least...  The latest spiderman actor, Andrew Garfield, and Johnny Depp are making a movie version of The Lone Ranger. No luck in that department either. I think that seeing Johnny Depp act as Tonto will be really interesting!  Anyway, the winery and film museum were interesting, and we picked up two bottles of a nice white wine. Then we headed back to town to reserve a spot on an evening boat tour.

The evening boat tour was a combination dinner/tour. The dinner was billed as a cowboy Dutch oven dinner, so Glen was looking forward to seeing what kinds of things they would cook up. There were several kinds of BBQ'd meats, a potato/veggie/cheese sidedish, baked beans, corn, rolls, salad, and apple crisp for dessert. At this meal Glen decided a third Dutch oven may be on his wish list so he can cook a main dish, a side dish, and a dessert. Santa??  He also determined that although the food was good, it didn't hold a candle to his own dutch oven meatloaf or stew recipes. 

We had a nice chat with the people at our table for dinner. It turned out that the gentleman across from us was a scout leader, and the people next to him were also big into scouting. So our dinner conversation consisted of talk about Dutch oven dinners, Boy Scouts and their shenanigans, and camping in general.

The boat ride was after sunset, and they had a light truck that would drive near the river and light up the canyon walls as a narration was playing. It included some geology, some western history, and some music. Because the river was extremely low....the safety tour included the instructions to just hold the PFD over your head and walk to shore as the water was only waist deep at the deepest parts....we could not go as close to some of the areas that were lighted as we normally could have. That made it a bit less dramatic than it may have been. But it was a nice gentle, cool, evening cruise on the Colorado River.

Friday was hiking day!  We rolled out of bed early to beat the desert heat as much as possible. Our planned hike was to Delicate Arch. That is the arch you see on all the Utah T-shirts! (and the license plate) Delicate Arch Hike  We had hiked this before when we visited Arches, and looked forward to a repeat experience. With lots of water and a snack, we set off to have fun. That goal was accomplished, and even though Terry got sand in her shoe and had to stop to apply a band-aid on the hole it carved in her toe....we did it.  Even Glen admitted that the heat really made an easy hike difficult, and we both shook our heads at the people starting the hike at noon with no water bottles in sight.

We then drove to another part of the park to see Double Arch. It is a beautiful sight, and hard to appreciate just how BIG it is until you put people in the photos. Glen once again climbed up into the arch to see over the other side, and Terry once again decided she was not a mountain goat. While going up would be okay, coming down would not be pretty.

The visitor center on the way out was our next stop. We hadn't stopped on the way in because we were trying to beat the heat. It wasn't built when we were here in 2006, so we had fun exploring the gift store and watching the interpretive film.  If you visit a park, we highly recommend seeing the film that they have. It is always a learning experience. (and sometimes the only air conditioning around!)

Next we took a side road out of Moab toward Potash to see some ancient Indian writings and some dinosaur footprints (allosaurus) that are within easy walks of the road. They were both really fun to find and the drive along the Colorado River was nice as well. It was downstream from where we had taken the boat tour, so all new scenery for us.

We decided we know why some countries adopted the practice of afternoon siestas. Two of the three days we were there, we would go swimming in the pool in the early afternoon, then retreat to the cabin for a nap, and then get up in time to enjoy the cooler evening and dinner. It really did help us cope with the heat.

Lastly, we went out to dinner one more time with Kim and Lisa to try to say thanks for the airplane tour. It was another evening of laughter and a perfect way to end our time in Moab.

From Smoke-Filled Skies To Death By Chocolate

Smoke filled the air around our campground recently, as just over 8,000 acres of the Dixie National Forest burned. Ashes dropped all over the campground, and the air was hard to breathe. The fire was called the Shingle Fire, and was about 28 miles south of where we are camped. Only one building was burned, and one fireman was slightly injured, so it could have been a lot worse.  It gave us a reason to watch the local news every morning, and Terry figured that if our area was evacuated we could be on the road in less than 10 minutes.  True to form, Glen wasn't worried at all.  Ignorance really is bliss.

 It is just one of many fires in the west this summer as everything is incredibly dry. The local fireworks for the 4th were cancelled. The fire fighters are working hard, and if we are lucky we may get a bit of rain this week. At the moment, the fire is 90% contained. We didn't take this photo, but it is the fire and a plane dropping fire retardant on it.

Our work and off days were a bit different this week, so we didn't go far afield. We took several day trips. First, we went to revisit Capital Reef National Park  We were hoping to hike a narrow trail that was a wagon trail in the days of the wild west, with a "Pioneer Register". As the wagons came through, many pioneers carved their names on the cliff walls.This trail also has some of the petroglyphs that are found in the park. We had done the trail once before, but wanted to get some photos to share with you. Unfortunately, Mother Nature had other plans. The looming thunderclouds had us rethink the hike as the raindrops started splattering us as we hit the trailhead. Since it is a narrow canyon, and prone to flash flooding, we did the "safe" thing, and just drove out.  This is the "responsible hiker" version of why we bailed on the hike, but the main reason is that Glen was afraid the camera wouldn't handle rain very well.  The drive out of the canyon is videotaped and posted to Terry's Facebook page. It is rough...taken on the phone camera, and with no narration. Below are some photos from the park.

 

The brilliant colors of the rock were muted on this cloudy day, but it was still fun.

We visited the little town of Torrey, just outside the park for lunch. The cafe was attached to a motel and gift shop. We loved the little garden entrance, and we actually had the whole restaurant to ourselves.  While that COULD mean the food was iffy....it didn't.  The food was wonderful, and we felt like we had our own private chef. We explored the gift shop, and found a treasure for the library.....

 When we put this guy on the library counter with a magnifying glass, he will be a big hit.












To travel to Capital Reef from Panguitch, we took one of Utah's scenic highways--Highway 12. There are many twists and turns on this road as it winds over mountains and plateaus. Glen decided that while the drive was manageable, it wasn't one that he wanted to drive on a frequent basis.





We traveled through many small towns, national forest lands, and parts of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. Glen even found a new friend at the visitor center in Escalante.







The next day we went for a bike ride in Red Canyon. We'll fill you in more on that local park another time, when we get some photos. It is really pretty and has a great bike trail.

We have made a bit of a Saturday night tradition with the Dutch Oven get-togethers.  This past Saturday, we tackled a bit of a project that the campground owner, Kathy, requested.  She had a cookbook in her store with a recipe called "Aunt Nellie's Death By Chocolate".   It just begged to be tried. So....we agreed to cook it and Glen's famous stew. (This was the first time this summer that he was allowed to use one of his "usual" recipes.) We invited the regulars and another family, the Sondermeyers,  staying at the campground longer than they expected due to vehicle trouble.

Some of you have asked about the Dutch ovens, so we took photos this time.

 

The photo above shows Glen's Dutch Oven table with two ovens in the process of making chocolate cake layers. There are charcoal briquettes both below the ovens and on top in order to make the cake bake. For something like a stew, you don't put the charcoal on the top.

 

The cakes are out and cooling. They had parchment paper liners placed in the ovens so they would not stick, and to make clean up a bit easier.

Transferring to our makeshift cake board, and ready to put the chocolate mousse filling between the layers.

With the chocolate mousse....










And with the frosting. 

We kept it in the cooler until after dinner. Then, we added homemade whipped cream and chocolate chips on individual plates as it was served.  It was a really big hit. Thanks, Aunt Nellie!
We had lots of sugary energy to play a few rounds of Uno Spin with the kids from the Sondermeyer family. It was lots of fun.

One of the local attractions in town is a restored movie theater.  It also has a local ice cream shop with homemade ice cream, waffle cones, etc. We visited it yesterday and sampled the goods.  We WILL be back!  We took some photos because it was just a cute, vintage place. And the popcorn smell was heavenly!

 

 

Tomorrow, we are on our way to Moab. We hope to hook up with two couples that we worked with in Montana, get a ride on the Colorado River in a boat, see some arches, and eat (or drink) in some local microbreweries. We may even find one of the local vineyards and see if we can find a wine we like. We will check in again after our Moab adventures. 

Glen and Terry