It was a fun day of touring. We left the RV before 9 to find a parking spot to take the Hermits Rest shuttle. It is more crowded here at the park than we had anticipated. One of the shuttle drivers said that all the oldies come out when the kids go back to school. Anyway, this shuttle route goes where cars are no longer allowed. It goes to 9 overlooks, runs about every 15 minutes. The sun was much better on the Canyon this morning than it was late afternoon yesterday.
Soon after starting on the shuttle, we saw our first elk. It was about 10 females grazing along the road. The first stop was at Trailview Overlook which looks over the Bright Angel Trail, the main trail to the bottom of the canyon. From this viewpoint, one can see how really tortuous this trail really is, the switchbacks, and the distance traveled. We saw lots of people on the trail, but we assume that many of them were just going down a ways. We also saw a donkey train coming back up the trail carrying supplies (or trash but not people). From this viewpoint, one can also see the Grand Canyon Village with the lodges and buildings there. I thought this was one of the neatest stops of the day.
All of the overlooks provided something different: from some we caught glimpses of the Colorado River, from others we saw more river or different formations. At one overlook I recognized it as the place where I took a photo of Bill on the edge in 1971. At Maricopa Point we saw the remains of the old Orphan Mine, a uranium mine used during the Cold War. There were lots of people walking the 7 miles of this part of the Rim Trail. We found it was easier to take the shuttle from one point to the next and walk a bit when we wanted to see more. About 12:30 when we were ready to head back, the shuttles were getting quite crowded, and we had to stand all the way back.
There is lots of construction going on in the park. They started last week after Labor Day, and we couldn’t get to the last overview because the road was closed. We retrieved the car and stopped at the Market Place which is near our campground. They are repaving the parking lot, and half of it was closed as well as some of the access roads. We found a way in and went to the post office to pick up more stamps. We went into the grocery store/gift shop which was fairly large and well stocked. We got lunch at the deli there and ate outside where it was quite pleasant.
We got back to the RV about 3 and collapsed. Bill napped, and I worked on photos. The weather has been great even with the temperatures last night in the 30s. The sun is warm, and the wind has died down.
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