Grand Canyon, Glen Canyon

May 15, 2010

Annette and I allowed ourselves to sleep a little later this morning. We got up at 5:00 a.m.!!

This allowed us enough time to throw on some clothes and walk down to the rim behind El Tovar before the sun came up over the horizon. We got some great pictures.

Again, it was a wonderful experience to watch the sun come up and to see the light change on the rocks and cliffs of the Grand Canyon.

Also, it was the right tactic for me to go to different spots for each sunrise. Although they are similar, there are differences in all of the spots. Some have more reds. Some rocks are almost white. The way the light strikes them changes them.

The changing light from sunrise, to midday to sunset, makes any spot in the canyon change and morph throughout the day. In some spots the reds are best with sunrise. But yet I saw some vivid reds in the midday sun. Sunset light shines differently still.

So after breakfast we started on our way to Page, AZ, where we were going to take a still water raft ride on the Colorado River. We needed to be at the meeting place at 12:30. I thought I allowed enough time, but when we plugged the address into the GPS, it said we wouldn't be there until after 1:00 p.m. Woah!! What a shock. We better get moving!

But then Annette smartly checked the current time on the GPS and found that it was an hour ahead of what we thought it was. Whew! We might just make it!

Even though we stopped at a roadside Indian craft stand, we made it to the meeting place by 12:15. they told us to meet out front at 1:00, so we went to the car and made sandwiches.

After a brief orientation session, we were loaded onto buses for the trip to the base of the Glen Canyon Dam. The guide said that this dam was wider than Hoover Dam!

On the way to the dam we went through a 2 mile long access tunnel. Every so often there were side tunnels that went out toward the river. Each of these side tunnels gave us a blast of light as we passed. If you ever go on this trip and they ask you how many of these side tunnels there are, tell them 18!

When we got off of the bus we had to wear hard hats. It seems that people like to throw coins off of the bridge. They try to hit the river but are rarely successful. The coins land on the path and possibly on the people getting off of the bus. Our group ran the gauntlet without incident!

The float trip down the river was very good. It was amazing to see the canyon walls from the river's perspective.

I thought the trip would take 3-4 hours, but from the time that we left the store until we returned it was closer to five hours.

Sitting on the bench on the boat for 3-4 hours began to make Mom's back hurt. But she was a trooper. She made it.

We were going to eat at the Dam Bar and grill in the Dam Plaza, but it looked a little too much like a bar. So we settled for an Italian restaurant in the Dam Plaza.