Grand Canyon Hike to Phantom Ranch – Saturday December 9th
to Monday December 11th
We started Saturday from the South Rim hiking down the South
Kaibab trail to Phantom Ranch on Bright Angel Creek near the Colorado river at
the bottom of the canyon. We spent two nights in bunk houses at the Ranch
before hiking out on Monday up the Bright Angel trail
We had a large group including: Tucson friends, Linda
Houtkooper, and Eric Schindler, my business partner, Dave Hamra, his wife Laura
Walton, Dave’s past business associate from Vanguard, Marty and his family: wife
Heather and their four boys ages 18 to 10. This hike was organized by Marty as
a right of passage for his 10-year-old, Colton. Marty’s older boys had done
similar events at age 10. Colton did fine and enjoyed himself.
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| Phantom Ranch area in center |
All you need to pack down are clothes. Food and bedding are part
of the Ranch services. It was refreshing to have the boys with us. They were
energetic, fun loving and well behaved.
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| The Black Bridge and Colorado |
The hike down is 7.4 miles with 4700 ft. of decent to the Colorado. As you might guess, the trail is well used. It is dusty with many built in steps. The steps get to your quads and calves after a while, but the views are spectacular. We started late so the temperature at the top was 40 and 60 by the time we got to the River. It took just over 4 hours to get down.
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| The Colorado from Clear Creek Trail |
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| On the Clear Creek Trail |
The day we spent at the bottom we hiked Clear Creek trail.
It climbs the north side of the canyon about 1200 ft. giving beautiful views of
Phantom Ranch, the Colorado and the South Kaibab trail we came down the day
before. In the afternoon we hiked a loop south across the Black Bridge, west above
the Colorado to the Silver Bridge and back to the Ranch.
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| Zoroaster formation |
Meals include breakfast, a sack lunch and dinner. Dinners were
delicious. The choices are steak, beef stew of vegi chili.
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| Cocktails before dinner |
Monday, we got a 6:30 AM start. It was dark and about 35
degrees. We used headlamps. The hike up was 9.5 miles and back up 4700 ft. to
the South Rim (7000 ft. elevation). We finished just before noon at about the
same temperature we started at at the bottom.
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| Zoroaster from the Colorado |
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| Looking down on Bright Angle trail and Indian Gardens |
Everyone made it in good shape, but a little sore!
How fun! Great photos. I did the same trail years ago alone during a roadtrip from South Carolina up to where I was working in Colorado. I met great people along the way (one couple from South Africa who I actually ended up visitng months later) and camped at the bottom for two nights. I really enjoyed going when I did (November) because the temperature was just right. It even snowed on the top rim the night before I hiked down. -Sara
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