The logistics regarding transportation and lodging took some planning and effort. Four of us left Reno in three different cars early Thursday morning. Bea and I drove to Las Vegas and stayed on the Strip. Jim and Pat each drove their car to a friend's house in Mesquite and spent the night there. Ivy flew from her home in Houston to Flagstaff where she rode a shuttle to Tusayan (South Rim). She checked into our hotel room at the Red Feather Lodge. This was the only place near the South Rim we could find a room and it was fine.
Friday morning Bea and I left Las Vegas and drove to Tusayan arriving at the hotel around 1:30PM. Pat drove to the North Rim and camped there Friday night. Jim drove to Tusayan arriving at our hotel around 5PM. Friday afternoon Bea, Ivy and I drove to the South Rim to acquaint ourselves with the location of the Bright Angel Trailhead and small parking area. We also stopped at the Backcountry Information Center.
Saturday morning we left my car at the Bright Angel Trailhead and Bea, Ivy, Jim, and I drove Jim's car to the North Rim arriving a little before noon where Pat was waiting at the North Kaibab Trailhead. Sidenote - at the trailhead was a table set up with a few people recording info (weight, water consumed. times, etc) for an event consisting of many people doing a day "hike" Rim to Rim to Rim (they were all ultra light and jogged some of the time.) Some we met at NK Tailhead said they had started at 5AM (pretty fast trip accross the Canyon)
We started down the Canyon around noon, hiked the 7 miles to Cottonwood Camp and spent Saturday night there. Sunday morning Pat hiked back up to NK Trailhead and camped up at the North Rim again on Sunday night. Bea, Ivy, Jim and I hiked the 12 miles across the Canyon and up to Indian Garden Campground arriving around 3:30PM where we stayed Sunday night. We started early Monday morning and hiked up five miles to the South Rim in about four hours arriving about 11:15AM. Pat had driven there from the North Rim to meet us. We all went back to the Red Feather Lodge where Ivy had booked another room for two more nights. It was nice to take a shower. Jim and Pat then drove back to the North Rim to camp there with plans to hike Wheeler Peak the next day. The weather was bad so they drove home to Reno on Tuesday. Bea and I drove Monday afternoon back to Las Vegas arriving about 6:30PM. A convention in town caused rooms on the Strip to be very high priced or unavailable so we stayed at a locals place on the north end of town - Sante Fe Station. It was conveniently closer to home than staying midtown Las Vegas. We drove back to Reno Tuesday arriving about 3:30PM.
We were lucky with the weather for our trip. I found out that October is a very comfortable time to be down in the Canyon. Temps at both campgrounds were mid 50's at night and at Phantom Ranch it was probably low 80's mid day. The "hottest part" between Cottonwood and Phantom (the Furnace) was shady and very comfortable for us Sunday morning.Saturday was blue skies, Sunday was mostly overcast and we had a little light rain in the afternoon which was refreshing. There was no rain as we set up camp Sunday late afternoon, but had some steady rain during the evening. Again no rain as we broke camp Monday morning. But when we arrived at the Bright Angel Trailhead at the finish of our journey we had time to take some pictures, then a cold front blew through and we had a fairly heavy rain and some sleet. Good thing we didn't start 30 minutes later Monday morning.
All in all we all thought the hike was easier than we anticipated. The 12 mile day was no problem and the 3,000' gain to finish the hike was also OK. I'd like to experience rim to rim as a day hike and compare that to our 15 hours total hiking time but without the heavy packs (we did carry tents, pads, sleeping bags, stoves). But I don't think my wife Bea wants to do that.And I'm not sure it would be worth it as you can see the logistics are a nuisance. She did show interest in another backpack trip in the Canyon maybe on a different trail. Maybe the Tonto Trail someday. I may be running out of time, Bea and I are both 64 but still in pretty good shape.
