More Hiking Stories

Last month I achieved a personal first, a landmark achievement in my outdoor adventuring career. I'll get to that in a bit. First, I have some much-overdue accounting to give.



In April of this year, I did something I had been wanting to do my whole life. I went backpacking in the Grand Canyon. I don't remember how old I was the first time I stood on the rim of the Canyon, but I had been to the South Rim at least five or six times in my life. I always thought the walk up to the rim was well worth the trip. No matter how many pictures, Circle-Vision Films, or 3-D IMAX films of the Canyon you've seen, none of it captures the sense of vast, enormous distances you get when you first walk up to the rim and look for yourself. I had seen this several times, and strolled about a mile down the Bright Angel Trail (the most popular trail into the Canyon for hikers and mule trains) a couple of times. But I always wanted to hike all the way to the bottom of the canyon and back.

In late 2007 my friend Travis Sayler and I began making plans to do just that. We requested a backcountry permit from the National Park Service in December (the earliest possible date to do so) and got a prompt reply informing us that our permit was approved.

I told my dad about it, and he pleasantly surprised me by asking if it would be okay for him to tag along. Travis and I invited several of our other minister friends to go as well. After numerous commitments, cancellations, and substitutions, finally our merry band of adventurers came together: Travis Sayler, Brandon Speak, Kevin Askew, Andrew Ryan, my dad, and me.

I must confess that all through this process of planning and training, I would occasionally have an extremely undignified giggle fit. I was actually going to backpack the Canyon!

We decided to do a four-day backpacking trip below the rim. We planned the trip so that if we were feeling saucy, we could take a shot at going from the South Rim all the way to the North Rim and back. We trained hard, loading our backpacks with old textbooks and running stairs and hiking the steepest trails we could find close to home.

Then in mid-April, we piled in a rental van (with Sirius radio and multiple screens for the DVD player - super-deluxe!) and headed west. The evening we arrived at the South Rim, we set up camp and then walked up to the edge just before sunset. For several in the group, it was the first view of the Canyon. Drew Ryan and I stood on the rim for probably ten minutes, just looking and chuckling and saying inane things like, "Wow! Whew! That's awesome." For two guys who fancy themselves to possess at least a journeyman's grasp of English vocabulary, it was a shameful performance.

The next morning we did our final pack checks, strapped everything down tight, and started from the South Rim, hiking down the South Kaibab Trail (a 4,780-ft. descent) the first day to the Bright Angel Campground on the Colorado River in the bottom of the Canyon.


The hike down was surprisingly easy, even accounting for the fact that we had gravity working in our favor. All six miles down the South Kaibab I was also charged with adrenaline. I kept looking around and snapping pictures, and that insane giggle fit would occasionally rear its undignified head. Most of the time I just let it out. The trail was well-populated, but there was still sufficient solitude to allow for some unrestrained fits of childish delight. When I was within sight of the tunnel approaching the Black Bridge (the footbridge over the Colorado River that the South Kaibab crosses), I started wondering why my knees and leg muscles weren't hurting much. I couldn't figure it out then, but now I think it must have been a combination of giggly adrenaline and the fact that my pack was much lighter than it had been in any of my training hikes.


We got to the Bright Angel Campground about lunch time. We ate, then explored around a bit. A few of us stuck our feet in the Colorado River (bone-chillingly cold at this time of year!) to ease the tender spots the descent had rubbed raw.

That evening, as we all spent a leisurely time sitting in our campsite eating high-carb, high-salt, high-protein foods and gulping quarts of water at a time, the giggle fits came again. Some of my less charitably-inclined readers are probably beginning to question the state of my sanity at the repeated mention of giggling. Others who have known me longer will not begin to question my sanity due to the fact that they abandoned the last shard of hope for my mental stability years ago.

Then the next day we arose betimes and asked ourselves the question, "Do we feel saucy?" We were much more stiff and sore from the previous day's descent than I had expected, but after moving about a bit we worked out some of the kinks. We decided we felt saucy. We would hike up the North Kaibab Trail, and some of us would make a bid for the North Rim. It would be no lazy day of strolling: the North Kaibab Trail runs 14.5 miles from Bright Angel Campground to the North Rim, and the North Rim is 5,816 feet higher in elevation than the Colorado River. Other features on the trail include Ribbon Falls at about six miles, Roaring Springs falls at ten miles, and the Supai Tunnel at twelve miles.

It was an awesome day of hiking, but none of us quite made it to the North Rim. For one thing, the North Kaibab Trail was still being repaired from spring flooding and ice damage, and there were some spots that were a bit dangerous still. Also, it was just a brutal ascent after the previous day's toll on our knees. Kevin and Drew made it the farthest: they turned around at the Supai Tunnel, a scant two miles short of their goal, when they were worried about losing their daylight in dangerous washed-out sections of trail. Travis and I made it to Roaring Springs, a beautiful spot where we stopped for lunch and then headed back. Brandon (who had slightly injured his ankle in one of his ninja tournaments a few weeks before) and my dad turned around at Ribbon Falls.


Ribbon Falls is a spot worth visiting. It's a gorgeous little hidden spot off in a side canyon. The snow-melt water splashes down onto a large mossy rock, and there's a spot where you can walk up behind it and even walk out into the icy water if you take a notion. I didn't take a notion, but while I was standing by the water to get my picture taken, the wind suddenly changed and completely drenched me in water the approximate temperature of liquid hydrogen.


Even in the ninety-degree-plus desert heat, I shivered for almost half an hour. Then we pushed on.

That evening, after all of us had finally returned to camp (Drew and Kevin well after dark), a few of us walked over to the Silver Bridge, also known as the Bright Angel Trail bridge. The moon was nearly full, and with no artificial light the Canyon was breathtaking. The most distant rock towers and mesas were picked out in ghostly silver detail. The cool wind scooting down the river gorge from the West and the surround-sound white noise of the current made the whole scene even more dreamlike. Conversations were restrained, voices low. A part of me wanted to cut loose with a whoop at top volume, but the rest of me knew that it wouldn't be appropriate - it would be like reacting to the beauty of a cathedral by exclaiming loudly in the chancel during vespers.

The next day we packed up and headed South again. Our descent had been via the South Kaibab Trail, a steeper, shorter trail. Our ascent would take the Bright Angel trail, the most popular trail that is, at 9.3 miles, longer than the South Kaibab, but also less steep. Also, we were going to take it in two chunks. The first chunk would be a bit easier: just over 4.7 miles, but only 1400 feet of our total ascent of 4,500 feet (for those of you keeping track, yes, the Bright Angel trailhead is slightly lower than the South Kaibab trailhead). The Bright Angel Trail is a bit more heavily traveled by mule trains, so the watch-your-step factor is increased as well. After that first chunk, we stopped for the night at Indian Garden Campground, which is on the lower Canyon plateau in an oasis on the otherwise-arid terrain. We set up camp in the early afternoon, ate, and relaxed for a bit. Then we walked out to a place called Plateau Point, just in time for sunset.

(Plateau Point, looking West at sunset)

Plateau Point was one of the highlights of my life. We were 1,500 feet above the Colorado River. Thus, it was like being at the top of the Royal Gorge (plus 300 feet) and still having 3,000 feet of canyon walls and rock towers above you all around. And when the sun went down, the moonlit dream sequence from the previous nights repeated itself, but in wide-screen, hi-definition glory. I took some time exposures with my camera, but they fail to capture the scene.

(This picture is the same view as the previous one, but lit only by stars and moon)

There was quite a crowd at Plateau Point for sunset - perhaps thirty or forty people at first. We lingered long after everyone else had left, using our backpacking stoves to brew coffee and hot tea on the rocks. (Backpacking stoves are the only kind of cooking heat source allowed in the canyon - a campfire will earn you a rapid community lynching.) The surprising thing - at least to Midwesterners used to a more humid climate - about being in the desert is that a day when the temperatures climb over a hundred degrees quickly cools to downright chilly after the sun goes down. This phenomenon was in full effect that evening, and I was grateful for my Smartwool hat and Icebreaker shirt. (I'm not compensated in any way by either company - though I'm definitely willing to discuss offers! - but I highly recommend both their fine product lines for any and every occasion.) The walk back in the dark through the cactus and desert scrub was a bit spooky - I was imagining scorpions and rattlesnakes holding a union meeting or planning the perfect ambush on the trail around the next bend.

That night was our last in the Canyon. The next morning we left as soon as we could get packed after sunup, trying to complete our ascent before the heat woke up for the day. This was the steepest part of the ascent, and after the previous days' cumulative toll on our leg muscles, the most difficult. Of course, the fact that we had eaten almost all of our food had lightened our loads considerably. Also, we had planned well so as not to have much heavy trash to haul out - and you do haul out ALL your trash in the Canyon. (If you don't hit one of the composting toilets on the trail, you even have to haul out your used toilet paper. Violating this rule can result in triple-digit fines and immediate revocation of your backcountry permit.) We spread out into our typical trail formation - Travis and Brandon usually in the lead, with Drew and Kevin somewhat behind, and my dad bringing up the rear in the best Purtle-Turtle-Tortoise style. My most comfortable pace is somewhat slower than Kevin's, and on this trip I tried to stay within a reasonable line of sight to my dad, until about halfway up when I felt like I got a second wind and really started stepping out. Drew had been playing the Hare role the first few days, though, and this last day he played it to perfection, his legs paying the price for his abuse. I caught him a little over halfway up and decided, hey, no sense slowing down when I've got a good rhythm going - I don't have to walk any more for the next few days after I get to the top.



Reaching the final switchback and seeing the trailhead above me was quite a rush. I started my insane giggle again, and kept it up until after I got to the top. I talked to the other guys for a bit, then ditched my pack and walked the quarter of a mile (over flat land!) to get the van and pull it up to the trailhead. By the time I got back, Travis and Brandon had walked down to meet my dad, and he was nearing the top of the trail. He came around the final bend and got his trademark mustachioed grin on his face. When he reached the trailhead sign, he simply said, "Oh yeah." Walking over to the van and the other guys, we all had one of those moments of shared triumph that men sometimes experience when they have overcome a great challenge together. It's a moment that sometimes involves a chest bump and a good deal of fist-pumping, but in this case it just consisted of some handshakes and quiet congratulations being passed around. The tired-and-grimy-but-very-proud expressions on our faces would have been the main indicators to anyone looking on that this group of guys had done anything out of the ordinary in the previous few days.

Then we showered, piled in the van, and drove to the Cracker Barrel in Flagstaff, which we proceeded to divest of its entire stock of foodstuffs.

The entire trip more than fulfilled my expectations, elevated though they were. It ranks as one of the best adventure accomplishments of my life. It is true that some crazy trail runners go rim-to-rim-to-rim in less than twenty-four hours, and our trip took four days, but I'm very proud of what we did. And now, I'm planning for the next time.

But last month came another accomplishment, the personal first to which I alluded at the beginning of this post. At the end of the summer, just before school started, Cindy and I went with her friends Candace, Lucinda, and Emily to hike the Taum Sauk Mountain section of the Ozark Trail. It was a quick overnight jaunt, decently challenging and satisfyingly scenic. The most exciting thing that happened was when Cindy was stung twice - Candace once - by hornets when we walked through their nest. Fortunately, neither of them had an allergic reaction to the stings. I happened to be wearing Ex Officio "Buzz-Off" pants and shirt - they're impregnated with Permethrin insect repellent, and work better than drenching yourself in Deep Woods Off! Again, I'm not getting any compensation from Ex Officio (although I am eager to discuss offers), but I highly recommend their product for summer hiking in buggy terrain. The fabric is light, dries quickly, and I haven't been bitten at all while wearing it. And as I've discussed in other posts, usually I'm known as an insect god - they follow me across the face of the earth, longing to taste my blood.

But my great victory was this: I carefully gathered the driest firewood I could find (not easy considering the recent rains), painstakingly built a firelay, and struck a match to it... and it BURNED ALL EVENING, on that single match. No chemicals, no paper, no accelerants of any kind were used. I'm an Eagle Scout, but this was the first time I had ever accomplished this momentous feat of outdoors acumen.

And then I brewed up the best cup of coffee I've ever had.

Folks, it just doesn't get much better.