Paul Goldberg Blog

GRAND Canyon

It has been on the bucket list for 50 years. We have always found ourselves driving “near” it in January or April. Way off season and we try to avoid cold, which at 7,000 feet on the South Rim it will be in those months. The bar mitzvah delayed our eastward migration until the first week in July. We endured much heat in Jojoba Hills and all the way through Phoenix area – average high of 107! Finally got to Grand Canyon and found tolerable temperatures in the 80’s.

We no sooner got set up in Grand Canyon Camper Village in Tusayan, as close to the southern entrance as you can be without entering the park, then we headed over to the airport to check out helicopter flights over the canyon. We waited 45 minutes for our flight with Papillion in their newest chopper. We took off and flew low over forest and desert headed for the canyon. We knew we were approaching the rim when the pilot dropped even lower and seemed to pick up speed. Then he turned on “Thus Spake Zarathustra” timing it so that the grand crescendo coincided with the ground dropping out from under us and the canyon being revealed. I laughed, I squealed with delight and I clapped my hands! OMG! We saw the key points one looks for in the canyon without really intruding on the tourists on the ground. We flew over the North Rim looking for buffalo (bison) that apparently had gone into hiding since the morning flight. Some saw an elk, Carol and I didn’t. After landing we drove into the park to get an overview.

Carol getting off the Helicopter. Better than words.

Somehow we still had energy so we drove into the park as far as the Village which is as far as a private car can go in summer season. We reconnoitered and planned for the next day before returning to the coach for dinner.

Friday we took in the NatGeo Imax, Almost across the street from our campground, then found a spot in the Visitor Center parking lot after a really good lunch at Sophies Mexican Restaurant. Carol was enticed because their signboard advertises vegetarian. We started riding shuttle buses and taking some walks to see the canyon. This is a great way to get around as there is limited parking, even in the visitor center parking lots and there is a shuttle that runs from Tusayan which permits one to avoid driving into the park. On our drives we also saw several cow and bull elk along the road. Exhausted we returned to GWhiz and put together dinner.

I am resisting posting pictures of the canyon. There are so many wonderful pictures on line and in books that it would feel foolish. This is Carol on the longest walk we took, just over a mile. We are both still recovering from our most recent trip and as we got exhausted from this really brief walk, I had to remind us both that we had come from sea level to 7,000 feet in a day.
Saturday we took the car and drove out toward Desert View Tower along route 64, still in the park. We stopped at the Tusayan Museum:
Figures made from a single twig split and bent

The “new” Kiva, replacing an earlier one destroyed by fire in the ancient Tusyan Village

and at the Desert View Tower:

which was too crowded and hot for us to consider climbing to the top. From there we turned back to G Whiz to rest and write. One stop along the way will provide what may be our exit photo from the Grand Canyon:
Duck Head Rock