My knees are not so happy with me.

This morning we got up at 5:30am to try and make a ranger led hike that was leaving at 7:00am. This was after I got about 3 hours sleep. The El Tovar may be a Grand Hotel but they still have those loud air conditioners in the room. So instead of keeping the air on all night that sounded like we were sleeping in an airline hangar, we decided to keep the windows open and enjoy the cool night air (oh, and ladies please note, if your husband tells you that it is SO HOT here and makes fun of you for wanting to bring a sweater, still bring it because it gets into the 50s at night and low 70s during the day-that’s sweater weather for me).

It was hot in the room. I am now barely awake.

Anyway, back to what we did today. So we tried to check out of the hotel and leave our luggage by 6:00 so we could eat breakfast and be at the shuttle stop by 6:30. That did not happen. One frantic worker at checkout, breakfast places weren’t open, etc. We grabbed some bagels at one place, got to where we thought the bus was leaving from at 7:00am, then changed to the new location and took the shuttle and arrived at our destination at about 7:45. Oh well, but we decided to walk the trail on our own. It was great.

South Kaibab Trail. Stunning.

We decided to hike down to the first stop called Ooh-Aah. It was .9 miles long. It took us 30 minutes almost exactly to reach our stop. The trail was super steep and there was NO RAILING. It was right on the edge. I held Nanette’s hand and made sure she was always towards the inside. Bill held William’s hand and did the same. There were beautiful sights, but if I looked up to see them, I felt like I lost my balance and would wobble a bit. There is no room for wobbling, let me assure you.

The trail was white limestone and rocky.

After we reached our destination and hung out for a few minutes, we decided to hike back up. Up is like going up a stair master! That is why my knees are not so happy with me. Anyway, early morning is a great time to do this trail because it is shaded most of the way.

That’s when Nanette started to get testy. She wanted to jump on the rocks and not hold hands. Run ahead and basically act like one of those 20-35 yr old boys I was telling you about. Then we had William on the other hand who was talking about death the whole time.