4th Update from Don

Those of you of my generation and the discerning of later generations will remember the great songs and aura that surrounded Route66 in the USA. Something like from “Chicago to LA more than 2000 miles all the way”. Well merely by accident rather than design we found ourselves on I-40 which is the successor to what became known as the Mother Road, but much of the old road is still in existence. And I couldn’t resist the opportunity to travel it for a few miles. We came across a real old time Diner at Amboy, Roy’s Diner. Right in the middle of nowhere. Couldn’t wait for a coffee and “eggs over easy” but the diner is in restoration and only bottle drinks available so I had a “Route 66″ Root beer and took a few snaps.

We stayed at Seligman overnight which is a sort of tongue in cheek shrine to the old 66, which passes through, with souvenir and gift shops all as an active museum utterly brilliant and just a little tacky. We stayed at the Canyon Lodge. The sort of place you walked around with a smile on your face.

On to the Grand Canyon. No words can describe, no picture portray the scale, the impact and the drama of the place. We had a meal at a Navajo Indian trading post. It’s a good job Dawn and I had been warned to share and not to have one each!

The next morning we were up bright and early because we had booked the first Helicopter trip of the day. Never having been in a chopper before neither Dawn nor I knew quite what to expect. Especially when Tanner our pilot limped up clearly having a prosthetic leg or a the very least seriously injured. We need not have feared the ride was superb and smooth, but the moment of popping over the rim of the canyon will stay with us for ever. Dawn had the seat next to the pilot. I was put in the back with a window seat (I suspect I was in the back because of my weight which has shown signs of increase over the last few weeks!). We were over the canyon for about 40 minutes; what a truly awesome and inspirational journey.

The next day we decided to take things a bit easier so we went to Bright Angel Trail and proceeded to walk down! We happily greeted all the people we passed on the way down and felt a little slighted when those on the way up could only manage a grunt. The trail itself goes from the top of South Rim down to the river at the bottom a distance of about 3 miles except the path is over 9.5 miles long as it zigzags down and drops 4,380 ft or 8/10 of a mile down! It is recommended that it is not attempted to go down and up in a day. Needless to say we didn’t but we did about 2 and a half miles down. I think some of the cheery people on the way down might have got few grunts from us on our way up. We were a little stiff later in the week. It was fascinating to get a different perspective of the canyon and it was always tempting to go further. We met one young man who had come down from the North Rim camped overnight and had come up the south Rim the next day. I did ask him if he had to go back to get his car. Another group had been 6 days rafting through the rapids in the Collarado and were now having to walk the 9miles or so up to get out.

Time came reluctantly for us to move on. We had a rather featureless drive to Las Vegas via the Hoover Dam. One drive up the Strip and back and it was goodbye to our faithful Chrysler after about 4000miles, at least 3500 of those with the hood down. The next morning early we flew out of Vegas leaving bright sunlight with the promise of another hot day to be met with the weather report from the pilot to say it was cold and wet in Washington. And it was and is!