This summer we went on our first ever full supported and catered mountain bike ride.  The food, the water, the groover, our gear, all rode in a truck and we only had to ride our bikes.  One hundred miles.  Telluride to Moab.

Now, I am a strong hiker.  I can climb out the 3,800 vertical feet on South Kaibab in three and a half hours.  Three, if I am trying to show up my kid. On a bike, not as fast.  Not slow.  And I can pedal all day long. But not as fast as the Colorado racers who were vying to see who could get into camp first every day.  Nor the people who had just finished the Ride the Rockies.

So I rode alone.  A lot.  Almost all day, in fact.  Pedaling madly along dirt roads, figuring that if the lead group were going to change routes, they would, in fact, wait for me.  Which, of course, they did.

The truck was behind me.  When Mr. Guide was driving it was RIGHT behind me.  Revving its engine.  When Ms. Guide was driving it was discretely out of sight.  Now and again the truck would ask permission to pass so as to get ahead and prepare lunch or set up camp, and I graciously agreed.  Then the guide not driving that day would drop behind and ride with me.

And I would say, pathetically, "I am a really strong hiker.  Honest! I could beat most of these people out of the Canyon were I back in my own territory."

And they would smile blandly and reply "Oh, you're doing great!"

Okay, I work taking people on hikes in the Grand Canyon.  I am paid to say things like that. That is MY line!  So I know YOU are being PAID to smile blandly and encourage me.

I understand that I was probably doing very well indeed compared to some of the riders they get.  In fact one gentleman backed out of the trip, asking for a shuttle to bear him away on day three.

Nor does it help that I don't like riding downhill.  Especially fast.  Especially on dirt roads with loose gravel, loose sand, sharp turns, and 2,000 foot drop-offs.  (Of course once we rode through the herd of incontinent cows, the sand attained a nostalgic quality.)  

Suffice it to say that I feel more kinship with my plodding hikers now.  I actually do say, "you're doing great" and mean it.  I take people in for their first backpack ever.  So, they take approximately twice as long to get out as I do, and yes, they are doing great.  But now I will understand when they don't necessarily believe me when I tell them so.

Riding down into Gateway:  I walked this part.

On the Uncompadre Plateau

Last night's camp above Moab

Fires were banned in Grand Canyon in 1972.  Of course, we still built them.  For a while.  We always figured that the only people who cooked on stoves were those too incompetent to cook on a fire.

When I got my first stove, a wee little Svea, I put my pot on and proceeded to set up camp.  That is how one cooks on a fire:  put the pot on the fire, do everything else, and by the time camp is set up, the water is hot.  On the stove, my water boiled over.  Almost instantly.

Okay, so cooking on a stove was not so bad.  But we still HAD to have a fire every night.  Even though the Canyon is a desert and sadly lacking in wood.  And what wood there is is very slow growing and thus does not replenish readily.  I recall Indian Garden and Bright Angel Campgrounds as totally devoid of life.  No grass, no twigs, no bushes, bark stripped from trees, because we HAD to have a fire. And so did everyone else.

More than 30 years ago, I was hiking on an alpine mountain with one other companion.  We found a campsite at tree line, open, airy, unspoilt.  Thought I: if we build a fire, the only wood around is this lovely krumholtz.  There will be a scar on this minute alpine plant life.  The campground will no longer be pristine.  So I asked my friend if he minded if we did not build a fire, and he agreed. That is the last time I even considered building a campfire.

Back in the day, when I routinely led hikes for my local Sierra Club Chapter, I would tell my participants up front that we would not have campfires.  In the Superstition Wilderness, where we usually hiked then, the Forest Service requested that visitors to build fires, and I didn't see why the Sierra Club, of all people, should gainsay them.  One hiker ate dried food, uncooked, for four days because he was by-god determined to cook on a fire, and I was just as by-goddess determined that he would not.  I offered him my stove, but he would cook on a fire nor nothing.  He is still not speaking to me.

It is, of course, possible to build a leave no trace fire.  It is a pain in the neck.  Better by far to cook on a stove and use the ambiance of a candle in the evening.  As for keeping warm, I have spent a night around a survival fire at 10,000 feet in 40 feet of snow.  I don't recommend it.  I would have been infinitely better off had I packed my down parka.  And breathing smoke?  Please.  Another evening in the Holy Cross Wilderness I was all set up in camp with a lovely view of the countryside below, and the party below me built a fire which filled the whole valley with smoke.

I have carried a good dozen bags of fire debris out of Grand Canyon.  An illegal fire leaves a scar on the land, scars on the rocks, and bags and bags of charcoal and ash.  Usually there is unburnt trash in said ash.  Also, the casual visitor may think, "Oh!  If they built a fire, so can I!"  So we schelp down garbage bags and carry it out.  Every time I walk across Mormon Flat on the South Kaibab I note with pleasure that the scar from the last fire I carried out is indiscernible to the human eye.  Or at least to mine.

Fires are old school. They are, like, so fifties!  Most of us have the most up-to-the-minute hiking gear we can afford, so why cling to this Neanderthal notion that fires keep the Smilodon away?

On one car camping trip, a friend groused for a week about no campfires.  Then she finally admitted: "You know, when you are not hunting for wood, and tending the fire, and babying the fire, there is an awful lot of time left to do other things."

Indeed.

Proof that trash thrown into a fire ring will magicaly vanish.  Not.

FIre at Deer Creek started by uneducated person burning TP

Bright Angel Campground in the 60's: no vegetation.

Tried to get to Skeleton today, but Brad's calf started acting up badly.  One little session on the wobble board... So rather than risk a bad injury we turned around at Cedar.

Cedar Ridge (3 miles RT, 1,000 feet) was our regular workout when we first moved up to the South Rim.  Skelton (6 miles RT,2,000 feet) was a long day.  Now Skeleton is the regular, and Panorama (10 miles, 3,500 feet) is the long day.  I told Brad if we keep this up, Pano will be our regular workout and we'll have to go to Ribbon Falls for a long day.

As one ages, one is told to work out regularly.  However, work out too hard, and injuries result.  Don't work out at all, and even walking across the room can trigger an injury.  Bitch, bitch, bitch.

I gave up running over thirty years ago when I pulled my calf.  I had warmed up and stretched and everything.  Then for the next ten years, about once a year that stupid calf would pull again, probably indicating that I had allowed it to heal up short.  Once in Kanab Canyon, which is an intriguing place to be hiking with a sore calf.  Anyhow, hasn't happened for over twenty years now, so it is probably gone.  But I still don't run.  Walk fast, but don't run.  Sounds like the name of a song.  Or a Dr.Who Episode:  "Don't blink.  Blink and you're dead.  They are faster than you can believe.  Don't turn your back.  Don't look away.  And don't blink.  Good luck."

And to get back to one of my pet peeves, why do people think that cigarette butts will biodegrade?  Or more likely, why don't they think at all?  I met a kid starting down who was smoking, and I said, "I hope you are carrying that butt back out".  When he laughed, I said, "I am perfectly serious".  Am also perfectly sure the next time I head down I'll find his butt(s).  Maybe vapes will be better.  Or maybe they have a  plastic insert that will be worse.  Let's just ban smokers from the Park.  No, I'm not prejudiced.

Goodness. this is out of date.  I suppose if one is too busy to update one's blog, that is a good thing.
Anyhow, in June we FINALLY did the White Rim on mountain bikes.  Fifth time is the charm.  I liked the east part best, because I am queer for rocks.  Then we took off on a supported ride from Telluride to Moab.  100 miles.  Went to Colorado to mess around Pagosa Springs, right in the middle of a huge forest fire.  Bopped on up to Buena Vista to climb Mt. Yale, then back to the Canyon to lead the North Rim Sampler class for GCFI.

In June we had rain.  Rain and floods.  The Bright Angel Trail flooded out, so I thought, ah ha, the mules can't get down to Phantom Ranch.  So I called and got the cabin with the double bed.  Really cool washouts all along the trail, too.

September did the five day hike into Supai for GCFI.  Two injuries: a broken toe and a sprained ankle.  People, people, people.  Supai is a Grandmother hike.  Fortunately the Supai run a helicopter service for $80.  Though the hikers beat the copter out, hee, hee.

In October I was SUPPOSED  to lead a six-day geology rim to rim, but the Government shut down (thanks, Tea Party) so all we could do for two weeks was bike and walk the rim.  The elk in the Park seemed to think they had finally managed to chase everyone out.  When we met them on the Rim Trail, they would charge us.  A 2,000 pound bull elk, his harem of ladies, and me on the rim side of the trail.  Interesting.  The day the Park opened again, I called Phantom Ranch and got the cabin with the double bed again, figuring that the mule riders had all been canceled.  I love living on the Rim.

Christmas we hiked to Phantom Ranch with Robbie and Renata, Brian, Rachael and their two bitsies.  One three years old, one one year old.  Boy, that brings back memories.  Robbie would scream until he fell asleep, and I would hike as fast as possible until he woke up and demanded, "OUT!"  Christmas dinner at the Ranch is always fun, though.  Two weeks after we went back to the Ranch for my birthday and hiked to Ribbon Falls on the layover.  No one there but us.

Robbie, Renata and me at the Tipoff.

As usual we have been doing our regular down-to-Skeleton and out hike at least twice a week.  Six miles round trip and 2,000 feet.  Over Christmas we hiked to Plateau Point for our long workout.  While we were sitting there (three other people) my phone rang.  Major social faux pas.   I walked out of hearing to answer, and someone had driven up to visit as a surprise.  "We are at Mather Point! Where are you?"  Plateau Point.  "Oh, how far away is that?"  About two hours.  So we missed those visitors.

Today we started for Panorama Point, but Brad's calf started tightening up.  He tried working on the wobble board at the gym, and the calf didn't like it.  So we turned around at the Breccia Pipe.  Why is it when I do something really long, like the Tonto Loop, no one asks where I've been?  But when I do a lousy five mile round trip, everyone asks, "Did you go to the bottom?"  Well, yeah, just not today.

We hiked to Panorama two weeks ago, and just before we topped out two young men asked us where we went, so we said, about ten miles and 3,500 feet.  How long did it take?  Five hours.  Oh, so we can do that.  Well, it is now one o'clock, and it gets dark at five... They waved us off and kept going, thinking, I am sure, "Oh, we will be faster than those two old fogies".  I should have hiked back down at dusk and sold them some flashlights.

Last weekend we ran into a couple on the first switchback who asked, "Does this trail go anywhere, or do you have to turn around and come back out?"  I still can't figure out a good response to that one.

Ribbon Falls on my birthday.

I recently mentioned to someone that I am leading a Field Institute group into Havasupai, and I needed to start organizing the use of a pack horse to carry most of my gear down.

She looked as though I had said I was carrying a can of spray paint to tag every rock between Hualapai Hilltop and the Village.    "You send your stuff down on a horse?"

Why not?  The last time I visited my physical therapist, the renowned Tom Martin, I got an exasperated look ("You again?  And what overuse injury have we now?") and a prescription to reduce the weight in my backpack whenever possible.  So that I can carry the usual 40 pounds when required.

Havasupai isn't a backpack anyway.  It is Disneyland without a parking lot shuttle.

In any case, why do I have to live up to others' prejudices?  They think I am a rough, tough backpacker who would not dream of reducing the weight of the pack, except by freezing my babushka off or going hungry.  Right.

For one thing, when I go to Supai I like to bring along books for the group to read.  For another, I cannot stand the amount of trash on the trail.  Looking at hiker trash and not picking it up makes my fingers twitch.  So I fill garbage bag after garbage bag and either leave it at the Village (on the way down) or take it with me in the car (when we leave).  The Supai who catch me at it always look a little surprised and mutter, "Thank you!"

People are shocked when they find out that I am not a vegetarian.  Or a vegan.  Or gluten-free.  When I was pregnant, everyone assumed I would undergo natural childbirth and were horrified to find that I wanted an epidural in the sixth month.

I was having a baby in the twentieth century, not in the Dark Ages.  I wanted every crutch modern medicine could provide.  As it was, I developed eclampsia.  That is what killed Lady Sybil in Downton Abbey.  It would have killed me and Robbie as well, had I opted for a midwife or a natural birth, and my practitioner or facilitator hadn't been taking my blood pressure regularly.  Instead I spent 36 hours (!) hooked up to a half dozen IVs, a fetal monitor, a blood pressure monitor, and several accoutrement that I was too wigged out to notice.  At one point I did mutter to the doctor that I was glad the Lamaze people couldn't see me.  He snorted.  "The Lamaze people are home asleep."

I have been hiking too long to live up to other people's' preconceptions of how I should behave or how much I should carry in my pack.  Heck, I've been living too long to do so.  I gave up behaving like all the other backpackers back when I was in college.

So if a horse is available, I send stuff down on a horse.  If not, I schlep it myself.  I eat pretty much what I feel like and depend on the amount of exercise I do to keep me healthy.  I don't rock climb, I do berate small children for carving their names in the rock, and I am always extremely tempted to tip a medium sized boulder over on top of young men cutting switchbacks.  ("Told you taking shortcuts could cause a rock slide!")

And I don't believe in bleeding, sickness caused by humors in the body, or a flat earth.

Time for the yearly pilgrimage to see the Redbud at Indian Garden.  We rode out the West Rim yesterday with binoculars, and we could see a few trees in bloom.  So we hiked down today, and maybe a dozen trees are blooming.  I assume that they will peak later this week or this weekend.  Unfortunately, I am working all week and we have guests on Saturday, so I may miss the peak this year.

Coming out nine groups yielded to the uphill (right of way) and thirteen did not.  Two of these get extra credit for making disgusted noises as I pushed through their little blood clot.  Learn the rules, people.

As A. E. Housman might say:
The loveliest of trees, the redbud now
Is hung with flame along the bough.
Poised along the Canyon trail
They make the very sunset pale.
Now of my eighty years (I pray)
Sixty will not come my way.
Take from eighty years a score
only leaves me twenty more.
And since to look at things in bloom
Twenty springs is little room
Into the Canyon then I came
To see the Redbud hung with flame.

We were supposed to do a nice, calm hike into Clear Creek this week, but life is what happens when you make other plans.  We must be in Prescott Wednesday, no ifs ands or buts, so I spent 15 minutes in the backcountry office re-permitting.

Clear Creek in one day less: no can do.  Bright Angel Campground full the last night.
Hermit to Bright Angel:  nope.  Indian Garden and Horn Creek full.
Kaibab to Grandview:  uh uh.  Whole use area full.
Escalante route.  Okay.  There is room on the Escalante Route, formerly known as the Death March.  Ranger Casey thought it was hilarious that I called it the Death March.  However, Red Canyon is full, so we had to camp at Hance Creek and hike out Grandview.

We figured that we have probably not done this route for at least five years.  Going down the Tanner was Okay, except that ice at the very steep, narrow, slippery top is scary, even with Katoolas.  In fact the whole first mile is steep, narrow, and slippery.  Redwall wasn't as bad as I remembered, though I did have to carry out some else's toilet paper (ugh).  We camped in a lovely beach site, lovely that is once I cleaned out and scattered the charming little fire ring.

As for the rest of the route, I remember pioneering this back in the 1960's.  Dr. Butchart suggested that we check it out one Veteran's Day weekend.  His exact words: I think there is a route between Tanner and Red Canyon.  At that time, the route climbed to the top of the Unkar Cliffs and then back down to the River and a nasty little down climb of a small cliff directly over a big whirlpool.  Now there is a worn in path which continues up and around the Dox formation and back into Escalante Canyon.

The major factor of this hike is that in order to get around one small cliff, which would take perhaps 30 seconds on a boat, takes 45 minutes to two hours to climb around.  Such is life off-trail in the Canyon.  So we climbed up and around the nasty little cliff, then up and around the 75-mile cliff, then stumbled into camp along the River.

Had to erase some graffiti in Escalante Canyon.  I expect that kind of nonsense in the Corridor.  I don't expect it off trail.  Rico and Pat: you have just advertised yourselves as amateurs and posers.  and Canyon Coyotes: just stay out of the Canyon.

We passed a private river party at Nevil's Rapid.  As we packed in the morning preparatory to climbing over the Papago cliff, I kept looking upstream to see if they were wending their way down.  I was going to throw myself into the boat to ride 50 feet down river rather than climb 200 feet up a nasty cliff and down a worse rock slide on the other end.  Alas, they slept in that morning.

So we climbed up the scary cliff.  At one point my water bottle fell out of the pack and rolled back down.  My anguished cries of "no, no, no!' echoed off the walls.  Actually I was a lot less polite than that.  Fortunately it stopped on a small ledge, and I was able to scramble back down and retrive it.
Then down the Great Terrible Rock Slide, which is indeed great and indeed terrible.  Then we were, praise Spirit, on a trail.

Climbed back out of Red Canyon into Mineral Canyon and finally onto the Tonto.  It was very odd to be walking on the flat, on a wide trail, where I could actually look around without fear of falling to my death.  Camped in Hance Creek, all by ourselves.

Climbed out Grandview in the morning.  Getting up the Redwall is scary too.  In fact, there was a lot of scary.  I guess I've spend too much time in the tourist areas of the Canyon.  It is humbling to realize that as spooked as I was, that is how a lot of people feel on the Bright Angel and Kaibabs.

Rocky section climbing around Cliff One

On top of Cliff One

Climbing down from Cliff One

On top of Cliff Two (75-mile canyon)

Below Cliff Two

Climbing around Papago Cliff

the Great Terrible Rock Slide: this is the good part!

On the trail again