Day 1: Travel Day - September 3, 2008

I was so excited about this trip, I could barely contain myself. After three stressful weeks at work (the whole summer was stressful, but the stress had ratcheted up during the past three weeks), I was more than ready to embark on a new adventure. Last summer, Nancy and I completed a rim to rim (north to south) in the Grand Canyon. We traveled with a tour group called The World Outdoors. We were two of twelve in the group and it was a great experience. Nancy has a deep, spiritual connection to the Canyon - ever since her 2006 17-day river rafting trip down the Colorado, she has been nurturing her love affair with this vast, ancient, and beautiful place. My first visit was last summer for the rim to rim.

Nancy knew she wanted to go back and I knew I wanted to go with her so thinking that a year in advance was long enough she called to make plans. The person she spoke with laughed saying she had to call thirteen months in advance and that nothing was available. The problem was finding space at Phantom Ranch, the only lodging available in the bottom of the Canyon. We weren't ready to try the backpacking/camping thing - I really wanted to sleep in a bed. Nancy kept trying to find a date and eventually found dates one day apart - part of a recent cancellation - so she made the reservation, not knowing if the dates would work for me or not. I made them work.

And here we were loading her suitcase into my car and heading to the airport in Manchester for our flight to Detroit and on to Phoenix. The first leg was uneventful - the second leg from Detroit to Phoenix was delayed as we sat on the airplane without moving for almost an hour while the Detroit maintenance and Northwest Airlines Minneapolis based maintenance argued about protocol. Once resolved, we were off on our 4 hour leg, a whole lot easier to bear than the 10 hour flight we endured on our Patagonia Chile adventure.

It was 100 degrees when we arrived in Phoenix, at the tail end of what they call their monsoon season. The day starts off cloud free, then as humidity rises and clouds develop, there is the inevitable downpour and thunderstorm in the afternoon. We took a shuttle to a huge megalopolis of a car rental place that hosted every rental company in the book and while every other booth stood empty, we stood in line for half an hour at the Dollar counter waiting to be ripped off by Arizona taxes and additional fees for a second driver. The agent tried to get us to pay even more for an upgrade when he found out we were driving to the Canyon saying the little compact car would have a tough time puttering up the mountain passes. We said no.

Our little Dodge Caliber did just fine flying up the Arizona highway at 80 miles per hour - 75 mile an hour speed limit. I started thinking about our return day and the timing of things - our flight was to leave at 9am - we needed to be at the airport at 8am or earlier - it was taking close to four hours to drive from the rental car place to the Canyon - that would mean we would have to be up and on the road by 3 am on the day we left. Besides the early hour we had to deal with the stress of finding the car rental place, returning the car, getting to the airport, finding some breakfast and making our flight. Blah... we decided to investigate leaving on the afternoon of the 9th and staying at a hotel near the airport in Phoenix.

We saw an incredible sunset - oh how I love the big sky out west! By the time we arrived at the South Rim Village, it was full on dark and it took some maneuvering to check in at El Tovar and drop our stuff at the Kachina Lodge and then try and find parking. It was 1 in the morning EST when we burrowed our way under the covers and found some sleep...

...until maybe 1:30 in the morning Pacific Time when we were awakened by people sitting in the grass outside our window talking really loudly. Nancy, bless her heart, got up and yelled (nicely) out the window, informing them that people were trying to sleep and to please keep it down or move on. Silence. Phew.