One bloody great hole in the ground...

... is one way to describe the grand canyon.  We'd taken longer than planned checking stuff out in Death Valley so it was getting towards the end of the day when we arrived at our campsite in Grand Canyon.   So  tents were pitched then we grabbed some pizzas and headed down to check out the sunset.  Forest made us decorate paper bags and then put them over our heads (geez, you'd think he didn't like looking at our faces or something).  There was then an awkward walk down while we linked arms, carried pizza and drinks and Forest led us along the path.  It didn't help that several of us are scared of heights and with paper bags over our heads imagined him leading us off a cliff.  But we made it to the edge, took off the paper bags and turned to see the Grand Canyon glowing in the light of the setting sun, followed by pizza and tequila sunrises on an outcropping while we watched the sun go down.  Magic.

With only one day in the Canyon, we started the next day with a 1 hour helicopter ride.  You have to fill out a form, sign your life away and then the bastards weigh you  (!!!)  so they can balance out the helicopter.  This was one of those days when I wish I was a short skinny woman so they would have put me in the front.  I was in the middle at the back which meant I got to see out both sides - and there was lots to see.  We couldn't go down into the canyon but we flew over the Colorado river the Little Colorado river, past Mt Hayden, the dragons, the battleship, the fault line and the whirls and lines of colour in the rocks.  It was well worth the trip.

With only the afternoon left, we went for a short walk down to Ooh Ahh point (named because of the lovely view).  It would have been nice to go down to the river, but it's a long way down, it was very very hot, and they tell you not to walk up and down in one day.  So Ooh Ahh point it was, and then to the visitors centre where there was a 30 minutes movie about the history of the canyon.

There was a bit of  excitement back at the campsite with an Elk right near the campsite, some rain (and the subsequent scramble to put up tarps to keep things dry while we cooked and ate.  As predicted, the rain had stopped by the time the tarps were in place.  We then joined a couple of the other groups round a campfire where we drank jagermeister and thanked our lucky starts we weren't in any of the other groups.

We had some crayons specially for drawing on vehicles in the van and I may have suggested that writing  on the other vans would be fun, and some of the others may have thought this was a great idea, and late, late that night, there may have been the patter of feet around the other vans and trailers, and a welshman may have written some crude remarks.....

Intrepid travelers take part in a western

Mum wants to hear about the horses but I first need to take you back to route 66 in the town that the movie Cars was based on (I forget the name of the town, something starting with S).  We were supposed to be walking down into the Havasupai indian reservation but the mules hadn't been answering their phone for a week so we didn't have any transport organized for the gear.  This meant a night in a motel - on reflection, the motel was kinda reminiscent of the motel from Psycho - and a walk through the town around sunset with a storm approaching (awesome sunset, flashes of lightening in the sky).  We had dinner at the Roadkill Cafe, played some pool, drank some beer and had an early night as we were leaving at 5am the next morning.

As we were about to set off down into the canyon, we discovered that only the tents and sleeping bags were going down on the mules.  Anything else we wanted had to go in our day packs.  So a clean t-shirt, underwear and a toothbrush were all added to my already very full day pack (3 litres of water takes up a lot of room).

The track begins with a series of zigzags down and you have to stand off the track whenever mules are going passed - which happens a lot.  Then it was a gentle walk down through this amazing canyon with high red walls, green green trees and a blue blue sky.  Amazing.  And kind like walking into hell....there is no wind and it's very very hot.  There was still some shade when we started off so after waiting for the rest of the group once, I decided to just keep going and get through the canyon as quick as possible.

I stopped briefly at the village but it was lunch time and everything was shut so I kept on going down to the campsite (another hour on).  There is a stream of clear blue/green water that starts just before you get to the village and then you follow down on to the campsite, past several waterfalls and then finally to the campsite area which is beside another set of waterfalls.

After the walk down, a swim was definitely called for.  There are basically four pools to choose from - the one the water falls into which is fun to try and dive under and up into, a larger shallow pool with a picnic table in the middle of it, a deeper pool that you have to be very careful in else you go over the next waterfall (only about 1 metre, but still...) and a little spa pool sized pool where I sat with my shoulders under the waterfall and had a wee massage.  Stef tried doing the same but the water kept pulling her bikini off....

Unfortunately, due to the delay in route 66, we only had the one night and those walking back up the canyon had to leave at 5.30am so it was a lovely meal cooked by Forest for us all, then an early night.  Even though 3 of us were riding horses back up, we still had to get up at 4 am with everyone else to pack up the gear.  But while they headed off up the canyon, we had a leisurely morning swim in the falls.  It was a little fresh, but a great way to start the day.

The horses were late but we had a nice chat to one of the people who looked after the campsite. I'd like to tell you his name was Running Wind or Attacking Bear but it was Chester Jones.  Chester told us about a pow wow he'd been to and how he'd really like to go to the gathering (where all the tribes get together).  I struggled not to smile when he said 'pow wow' - I really did feel like I was in a western movie.  He attended an indian school run by a different tribe - apparently they do that a bit.  Like an exchange programme I guess.

The horses finally arrived and they assessed our experience (Q: have you ridden before? A: yes, a bit) and then on we climbed and off we went.  No helmet, no checking the stirrups were the right length, no instructions.  We spent the next three hours at a trot up the canyon.  All my riding experience has been on an english saddle, but this was quite different.  The stirrups were too long so there was no way posting was going to work, so I just tried to bounce with the horse....

We arrived about half an hour after the walkers and my arse was sooooo sore.  I needed a little bit of help getting off the horse and then I felt a bit dizzy so I sat on the ground for about 10 minutes before joining the rest of the group in the small bit of shade that they'd found by the toilets.

Havasupai canyon is a sovereign indian nation and was an interesting place to visit.  It's not governed by american law, but gets some federal money.  The man who owned the horses that we rode out had never been out of the valley, but Chester told us to add him on Facebook.  This dichotomy of traditional and modern sums up our interactions with the native american people on the reservation.  It was a great place to visit.  I wish we'd had longer to explore down in the valley to explore the other waterfalls.