My Trails

Wow!

There are all sorts of ways to spend money while visiting the Grand Canyon, and those ways reached deeply into my pocket yesterday and today. I figure I will only get to do this once, so why not add a couple more things to the bucket list.

Although I have already seen the IMAX movie about the history of the Grand Canyon, I remembered how good it was and went again. The movie is well done and the action scenes make you feel like you are actually running the river and flying through the canyon.

This morning I drove to the airport and purchased a ticket for a scenic, helicopter flight over the canyon. It was expensive but well worth it. They fly two different helicopters – the Bell 130 and something called a Eurocopter. Most groups were flying in the Bell but our group was shuttled over to another area where the Euro Copter are kept. I overheard someone say they have more glass and a better view. There were 6 passengers plus the pilot. I was lucky to get the best passenger seat – front right side – while a family from the Netherlands filled in the back seats.

It is an experience that can’t be described. Everyone was taking tons of pictures, but the Grand Canyon will never be captured to an image. It is just too vast. Probably the best part is when you break over the rim and fly out above the thousands of features on display. When you arrive at the North Rim, the pilot flies up through a gorge for a while before banking over a ridge and heading back. It was fun, I can’t put it any other way.

I rode into the park late in the day yesterday. I wanted to make sure the afternoon thunderstorms were over. Even at 6:00 pm there were four lanes filled with 6 cars each waiting to pay $30 each to get in. My senior card keeps paying for itself over and over. I think I will go back today because I have a lot of dirty clothes and it is the only laundry near here.

San Francisco Peaks

New camp

I woke this morning to bright sunny skies and decided to make the move before the rains came again. I packed up and drove back to Flagstaff for a quick dump at the Giant station and food at the Walmart, then headed back up 180 to get closer to the Grand Canyon.

Rt. 180 was a nice road with little traffic. It passes through pretty forests of the Kaibab and Coconino with many options for dispersed camping. I have to be kind of picky and choose my forests roads carefully as many of them are rutted and soft from all the rain.

I stopped at a pay campground on 64 called 10 X just to check it out. The spots were tight to get into and not very level. There were still quite a few people there, presumably left from the weekend. I was mainly looking for a dump station and water for when I come out, but they had neither.

As I entered the town of Tusayan, just a few miles from Grand Canyon National Park, a sign announced a forest road to the right. Only a mile up the road I came to several open campsites. I parked Minnie and walked around until I determined the best one and staked my claim. I have good cell signal and quite a lot of holes to the sky. The main drawback to this place is that it is in the sightseeing, helicopter flight path for the Canyon. There is a constant stream of helicopters that buzz 100 feet above my head.

Oh Yeah!

Through the trees I can see the San Francisco Peaks with the formidable prow of Humphreys Peak standing proudly in the middle. Humphreys Peak, the tallest mountain in Arizona at 12,600 feet, beckons me to climb, and if I were a little younger, I would welcome the challenge. When I was here a couple of weeks ago the mountain tops were white with snow but now the tundra in the alpine region is only the color of… tundra?

You can almost set your clock to the afternoon thunderstorms. Today’s storm was not as violent as usual but it brought a little hail with it. This is probably not the best time to be climbing in the mountains because you would reach the top about the same time as the afternoon storms.

It has been nice to have pleasant temperatures to ride my bike. I rode into Flagstaff yesterday for a visit to Walmart and today I rode a few miles north to check out more forest roads. This motorcycle will do just about anything I ask of it. It eats up the rough and rutted back roads like a champ and accelerates up mountain roads with no problem. I still go pretty slow on unfamiliar dirt roads and haven’t got “big air” on any jumps so far. I may be a little to old for that foolishness.

There were several trucks on the side of the road as I drove towards Flagstaff. I asume that most of them were in some stage of mechanical distress because many had their hoods up and they were stopped in places normally inappropriate. It is tough on a vehicle to climb several thousands of feet onto the Mogollon Rim and even tougher to do it in hundred degree heat while working air conditioners to the max.

A few miles from Flagstaff a big class A motorhome flew by me going at least 80. A while later I came to men putting up signs that there was an accident ahead. When I came to the wreck It looked like the motorhome had blown a front tire, slammed into the guardrail, slid across the road, and plowed up several feet of earth down on the median. High speed, hot weather, and old tires are a bad combo.
I found a forest road 5 miles north of Flagstaff off of highway 180. The road was filled with ruts but I was able to straddle all of them until I found a nice boondocking site within a mile of the main highway. I setup camp, unloaded my motorcycle, and set out to explored the area. I guess I was lucky because most good spots on the roads I checked were taken. I didn’t travel far because storm clouds were moving in fast. Just after I got back home, the sky opened up with buckets of rain and close lightning.

The temperature here is pretty good. I even had to pull another blanket over me in the night. I would like to move a little closer to the Grand Canyon – 70 miles from here – but I’m reluctant to find a new place until after this big weekend. If I can find a boondock that has good cell and places me a reasonable distance to outrun thunderstorms, I will stay and explore the Canyon next week.