I was in a hurry to make my hike. We’d leave at 1:30pm with the car. So only 3.5h to hike.
looking down
Decending into the Grand Canyon there were so many cute squirrels. I’ve always liked them because when they hold something it really looks cute 🐿️🙏.
They were mostly minding their own business
Tree over the trial with a 🐿️ gathering green acrons (on the left)
Sometimes they were more curious.
Wildlife should be kept wild. Evidently people were giving them some food.
I’m cute give me food
is that touch?
At the three point mile there was a water station with portable water. This squirrel you can see above was chilling there.
I was speeding downhill alone. I didn’t really do any breaks. Except one break where the road was being worked on.
The workers are stationed in the valley and live in the valley. They only have a few power tools to work with.
They have to secure the road and do maintenance work. The Erosion destroys the paths over time and it is unsafe for humans. Mules have to walk on this path and be able to pass each other too.
They gather sturdy rocks on the upper parts and move them manually to the desired spot. They use levers and ratchets.
In the bottom left corner you can the the ratchet.
posing with a hammer ⚒️
I ended up on the bottom at a campground. This was 11am (so 2h after I started) and I had to turn back without much of a break.
In the next two hours I hiked up the path (7.7km). In the end my speed decreased but it was fine I was still in time.
I did not really eat anything during or before the hike except a few chips. I drank lots of water to keep me hydrated. The problem was that I was losing my salts but I didn’t notice.
Grand Canyon
The view wasn’t even good in the trenches. The higher up the better the view. In the afternoon on the way to Needels.
In the afternoon on the way to Needles (right on the border of CA) I had increasing headaches.
Colorado River on the border to CA
We went south and then west in the direction of LA. Needles is merely a nice stop on the way. USA is just huge.
The weather was bad. It was windy and there was a hurricane coming called Hilary.
windy
I had so bad headache I ended up in bed at 7pm and would sleep for the next 13h.
I’ve learnt something. Next time I will take my time and amble through nice landscape.
