Rim-to-Rim - We Did It - In One Day!

I am breaking this post into 3 or 4 parts - there is just too much for one. I will first cover the hike itself.  Then will talk about the people we ran into, what we did right and wrong and a bit about before and after.

Gary, Greg and I started the hike on the North Kaibab Trail at 5:30 in the morning. After my blog post How long will it take???,  we decided this was a good compromise between having enough time and not getting enough sleep. This turned out to be perfect. The temperature was in the high 50's. I decided against a jacket, wearing only my Nike compression shirt, my SmartWool long sleeve shirt and my running gloves.  We said goodbye to our wives, turned on our headlights and off we went.

The first leg of the hike is amazing. You start out on some switchbacks for a few miles as you work your way down. The first half hour was dark but our headlights were more than sufficient to light the way. Before we knew it, we were turning them off and enjoying the rising sun.

We passed a number of hikers who started before us. More on this later...  We soon came upon the Bright Angel Creek gorge, which we followed all the way to the Colorado River. But I am getting ahead of myself.  The hike along the creek was absolutely beautiful. I must have taken 50 pictures and easily could have taken more. I think I took 20 trying to catch the moon just over the rim. Every turn created another spectacular view.

We took one detour along the way. That was to Ribbon Falls. Our waiter the night before recommended it and he was right - well worth the extra mile. You cross a bridge and have to navigate a tricky trail, but the result is a waterfall that is unusual, hard to explain and beautiful. Water falls from on top of a dome that is covered in moss and from there creates another falls into a pool.

We only stayed long enough for some pictures and for Gary and me to dip our feet in the cool water. Then back the way we came (later to find that there was another way out that would not have required as much doubling back), onto the trail and on our way.

We continued down the trail, past Cottonwood to Phantom Ranch, about 16 miles into the trip.  It is so cool to see lots of people, picnic tables, cabins, bathrooms and a building where you can pre-order food, buy drinks and snacks, or just sit down and eat your lunch.  We had been planning to stop, have lunch and enjoy a cold beer.  And we did JUST THAT!  What a treat!  We kept the stop to  45 minutes - still a long ways to go.  Gary's feet were bothering him, so after eating he did some repairs (moleskin). We hit the bathroom, refilled our water and off we went.

It was not too long before we came to the Colorado River.  We crossed over Silver Bridge.  This was pretty cool.  From here you could see up and down the river.  We didn't see any rafters but did see the Black Bridge, used of you were going up the South Kaibab Trail (rather than the Bright Angel Trail we were taking).  We followed the river for a couple of miles before we headed into another gorge along Pipe Creek.  After another couple of miles we split from Pipe Creek and joined Garden Creek.

It was getting pretty hot.  We later found out that it was over 90 degrees (it had been over 100 degrees the day before). Thank goodness there was a nice breeze!  After a good long climb, we arrived at the next destination - Indian Garden.  This is almost an oasis in the desert.  It is pretty flat with a camp ground and lots of trees on both sides of the river.  We stopped here to rest and have some food before filling up with water and heading back on our way.  Less than 5 miles to go!

The leg up to the 3 mile stop was a bit of a challenge, with some steep areas and a lot of zig zags. Everyone was getting tired and trying to find their pace.  We were doing it, coming out of what just looked impossible!  We stopped to rest at the 3 mile.  As we started up, everyone had a pace that was working and before we knew it, we were arrived at the 1.5 mile stop. We didn't rest for too long before we were back on our way.  We were no longer worried about making it.  The excitement was building and the pace quickening.

They saw us before we saw them.  As we rounded the second to last turn, we spotted our wives waiving and taking pictures.  One more turn and we were there.  More pictures, high fives and lots of chatter about the hike.  Our energy was back.  We headed to the car for a beer and some snacks. I surprised Gary and Greg with shirts that I had made up just for this occasion.

My Strava says we hiked 28.4 miles with an elevation gain of 8,626 feet.  We left at 5:30 and arrived at 5:45,  That means we were on the trail for 12:15.  What a great accomplishment!

A big thanks to Greg and Gary for wanting to do something like this.  For training.  For putting up with me as I chatted most of the way (and most of the time on our practice hikes).  And for for putting the work in to complete this!