Day 1
Long Beach to Grand Canyon -- 8 hours
We got off to an early start on our adventure--we were on the road by 6 a.m. (Which, for anybody who knows me, is dang near unbelievable.) I honored my vacation bribe/tradition with Mark--I bought him donuts in exchange for getting up peacefully and cooperatively.
The drive to the Grand Canyon took about eight hours, but it didn’t feel that long. We were so happy to start our vacation that it felt like the car was running on excitement instead of gasoline. But just in case, we stopped a few times along the way for gas and to stretch our legs.
It was fun to watch the scenery change as we moved ever closer to the Grand Canyon. I was surprised at all the trees and greenery--this was Arizona after all, and we were in the middle of the desert.
As soon as we arrived at the Canyon, we hit the ground running. We pulled in to the first view point and giddily trekked toward the Canyon. We rounded the corner of the path and suddenly, it took our breath away.
There it was, the Grand Canyon in all its glory. I’d been once before, when I was a kid, but my childhood memories did not serve the Canyon justice.
It was stunning, various layers of sandstone, mudstone, and limestone stained red from oxidized iron. It was huge, vast, colorful. The edge closest to us dropped dangerously, and through the shrubs, you could see the steep drop.
The other side of the canyon seemed so far away, and it was so picture-perfect, it looked fake. It really looked more like a painting than real canyon walls. We just stared and stared at it, mesmerized. We eavesdropped on a ranger explaining how the canyon was formed to some other tourists. We listened to all the different languages spoken around us, and watched all the tourists crowd around the edges and take photos.
On the way back to the car, Mark and Edra started calling out license plate states. I’d printed up a U.S. map for Mark for the trip. Every time he saw a license plate from a different state, he had to color it in. But we should’ve started the game AFTER the Grand Canyon, where every car was from a different state. Mark even found Hawaii, which I was convinced we’d never see! By the end of our first day in the car, he’d colored in 22 states.
We grabbed a quick lunch, then checked in to our room. It was a “partial view” room, though after looking out the window, I realized there was nothing partial about it. It’s about 20 feet from the canyon wall, and looks right into the majestic canyon. We were thrilled.
We dumped our bags off and took off to explore. The first stop was the visitor’s center. We got lots of great info about all the ranger programs, and watched a cool little movie. Afterwards, I strolled down toward the bathrooms, and noticed a crowd of people taking photos of something. I moved in to find out what.
It was this little guy:
I couldn’t tell what he was at first; I thought it was a mouse stuck in the wall or something. Then it dawned on me--it was a little bat! It was our first wildlife sighting.
The visitor center was closing, so we jumped into the car to go back to our hotel. And that’s when we had our second wildlife sighting--this elk, standing on the side of the road! She was gorgeous, and completely unafraid of us. We drove right up next to her and she never even budged. We erupted into another fit of excited giggles.
Then it was on to our next adventure--the sunset. We knew it would be spectacular here, and didn’t want to miss out. We caught a bus to Hopi Point, which we’d been told was the best place to see the show. The bus driver told us it was packed, and that’s when we realized Arizona has different standards for being crowded--there was tons of room left. It was not anywhere near my definition of crowded--which is the sunset in Santorini, when people literally climbed the roofs of all the buildings a good 90 minutes before the sun even went down.
And then our early morning finally caught up with us. We’d planned to attend the ranger program at 8:30, but opted for dinner instead. We filled our water bottles with Colorado River spring water, and headed home. But as were entered the parking lot, Edra spotted another female elk, only five feet away from us! It was dark, but even in the dark she was beautiful. She had no fear of humans either.
It was only 10 p.m., the earliest I’d been to bed in a long time, but considering I’d been up since 4:30 a.m., and had spent eight hours driving and another eight hours exploring the Grand Canyon, I was okay with that.
So, our Great American Roadtrip Adventure is already off to a spectacular start!
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