Weather Perfect Day on the Southern Rim

Richard and I slept in late this morning. We had a very long (although extremely fun-filled) day yesterday so I thought a little extra sleep today was in the cards. Plus I wanted to see the sunset at the Grand Canyon which meant we would be there for a while once we arrived. After breakfast at the hotel, we fueled up and got on the road arriving at the Grand Canyon Visitor Center about noon.

I saw online that there were bike rentals on the canyon rim and thought it would be cool to do this. Riding along the rim and then stopping along the way to soak up the scenery and take a few photos. So we rented mountain bikes and helmets and rode off. Well, it's kind of confusing where you can ride a bike and where you can't. Unfortunately most of the bike riding was on the Greenway which is a trail in the woods. It wasn't what either of us expected. After riding around confused about where we could ride, we opted to go back to the visitor center and go in the opposite direction, toward Mather Point. Along the way, my chain came off. Richard was able to get it back on without getting too much chain grease on his hands. Then we found that you aren't allowed to ride bikes near Mather Point either...further beyond that you can, but by this time, we both lost our biking enthusiasm. So we rode for an hour and a half, then turned our bikes in opting to walk and take the bus shuttle. I did get a refund (although I didn't ask for one) so we essentially paid for one hour of biking and got a little extra.

We walked over to Mather Point for a bit and then Richard's belly started rumbling. The only food place I'd seen was the Canyon Cafe so we hopped on the Blue Route shuttle for lunch. Actually the prices in the cafe weren't too bad, especially for a tourist area. After lunch we jumped back on the blue line and got off at the red line transfer stop. This is where the paved path begins for walking the rim. This was so exciting. The paved trail is lined with small boulders so people will stay on the trail and not venture too far near the edge, but folks still do. There are some really wide areas inside the path that are fine and not close to the edge.

We saw many deer today also. They weren't very large and one (not pictured here) had some nice antlers coming in. Richard videotaped with his phone and I took some photos. 

We walked out to Maricopa Point and the color was really beautiful. This was about 5:00pm. It is hard to say how they will come out, but the memory of the beautiful color is vivid. We finished out walk at Hopi Point which is the end of the paved rim trail and the beginning of the unpaved rim trail. The unpaved walk will have to be saved for next time as by the time we got to Hopi, it was about 6:15pm and we settled in to watch the sunset. Soon the area was a bit crowded with folks who came up just to watch the sunset.

We watched the day end sitting three feet from the edge of the canyon surrounded by families, couples, old people, young people and teenagers. It really was a beautiful sight and something every person who goes to the Grand Canyon should make time for. I'm glad we did.

Then it was time to take the bus back. It was a bit crowded...and then we had to switch lines from Red to Blue, and the Blue line bus was extremely crowded. Finally, we reached the parking lot and, if you forgot for a time where you were, you quickly remembered when you stepped off the bus into almost complete darkness.Thankfully Richard had a flashlight on his iPhone and the car lights came on when I pressed the car key.

We made it back to the hotel at 10:30pm. Tomorrow we check out and drive back to Las Vegas for our return flight home. I'll try to blog before we check out..