On the road again…..
We took off from Tucson finally, bidding farewell to the Voyager RV Resort and our bocce friends and headed home via Flagstaff and a few last hiking opportunities. Having never been to Flagstaff we were very pleasantly surprised by the vibe of the town and the beautiful scenery. We camped in a cute little KOA right at the base of Mt. Elden and loved being back in the pine forests and crisp skies of the high mountain desert. The San Francisco Mountains still had snow and beckoned us toward the terrain change from miles out of town.
First things first, we hit the historic downtown area for a little lunch and walkabout. We found lunch and a proper patio scene at Lumberyard Brewery with still a bit of a chill but enough sun to pretend it was a spring day! Then we bopped around town checking out Babbitt’s Backcountry Outfitters, a few art galleries, a great little bookstore and the train station/visitor center. Flagstaff was a big train hub and there are still plenty of trains coming through town…
The next day we headed to Walnut Canyon National Monument (which btw we had never heard of) and it was AMAZING. A canyon which has provided shelter and sustenance for Indigenous Peoples throughout time, and which you can hike through seeing the remnants of their cliff dwellings. There are only two hikes in the national monument and we did them both (full disclosure: they are both very short, but it sounds good doesn’t it??) The Island Trail has some steep stairs to conquer but takes you down to a rock formation called The Island, which you can walk around getting up close and personal to the shelters they created while looking across the canyon to even more dwellings. Although just under a mile, there is some vertical but don’t let it stop you. It’s worth the climb and a tribute to the ingenuity of those who lived here. We also drove through NAU campus which had a nice feel and a great recreation center. All in all, we loved Flagstaff and can see spending more time there. Small enough, cool vibe, great air, nice pines….slows you down in all the right ways.
From Flagstaff, we drove to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon for two nights. We dry camped just outside the gate at Long Jim Loop campground and it was very peaceful. I’ve been lucky enough to hike/camp in Havasupai with Eli, and raft 11 days down the Colorado with amazing friends and family, but I’d never been to the South Rim. We were there in late April so there were crowds, but it wasn’t too bad yet. They’ve done a nice enough job with shuttles and paths to move the crowds around, but if you are heading that way go in the off season. It was already a little too crazy for us….We hiked along the South Rim that first afternoon and then I got up the next morning and took the South Kaibab trail to Ooh Ahh Point! I really wanted to get under the rim and Ooh Ahh point was a fairly easy hike to get my fix. I had just finished reading A Walk in the Park, Kevin Fedarko’s new book about his epic thru-hike, and had been transported back to the AWE of that Grand Canyon through his words. He writes about some of those he met on the trail, describing them this way:
” they were pilgrims because they had come to a holy place-a cathedral in the desert-in the hope of standing in the presence of something greater than themselves, something that would enable them to feel profoundly diminished and radically expanded in the same breath. They were pilgrims because there is something sacred in the belief that despite its ugliness and its many depravities, there are still places in our fallen and shattered world where wonder abides.”
I’m not crying, you’re crying.
