Grand Canyon, AZ
We camped at Mather campground which is very nice and has big pine trees which gives it a forest feel.
It wasn’t far to walk from our campsite to the entrance of the campground and there is a blue bus stop right outside which takes you to the visitor centre and links you up with the other two bus routes – the orange and red one. It would be chaos if everyone drove to all the lookouts. The first afternoon we decided to do the orange route. Lindsay hated to admit it, but he was impressed. We both were, it is truly amazing.
I read that Hopi point was the most popular place for sunset and sunrise, they also suggested going somewhere else but we didn’t take any notice, so we decided to drive there. It’s a very confusing place to drive and we drove around in circles for a while before we worked out how to get to the orange route, only to find it is blocked off from cars. We had cooked our dinner in advance and thought we could eat it looking at the sunset over the canyon. Instead we had to find a parking spot which in itself was a challenge as this a very busy area as it’s full of lodges. We then had to grab everything we would need and be able to carry it, so no dinner! The sky had started to get overcast, so we knew there was a chance that I wouldn’t be getting any good photos, but we went anyway. Despite the weather, the colours in the photos turned out much better than the ones I took during the day.
The next morning we got up early and drove to the orange bus again. Again we had horrible weather and it started to rain. The forecast was for rain today and thunderstorms the following day. We decided to leave and come back when the weather was better. Near our campground they have a laundry and showers. For $2 you can stand under the hot water for 8 minutes, a luxury after so many days without one.
On the way out we took the desert view road to the east and saw some great vistas which also included glimpses of the Colorado River.
Our mission today was to buy a gas bottle as the little disposable propane bottles that most people use only seem to last a few days. It took a few hours to find Camping World as the address is wrong, it says it’s in Flagstaff but it’s in Bellmont, which is about 28 miles down the road. We finally found it and got one but they don’t fill them. So we had to go back to Flagstaff to the U-Haul place to get it filled. So frustrating. We then tried to find a campsite that had been recommended to us, but failed. So it wasn’t a good day.
We ended up in a lovely state park that had a river running along the side. There were warnings that this was bear country, but we didn't see anything more than a squirrel.
It wasn’t far to walk from our campsite to the entrance of the campground and there is a blue bus stop right outside which takes you to the visitor centre and links you up with the other two bus routes – the orange and red one. It would be chaos if everyone drove to all the lookouts. The first afternoon we decided to do the orange route. Lindsay hated to admit it, but he was impressed. We both were, it is truly amazing.
I read that Hopi point was the most popular place for sunset and sunrise, they also suggested going somewhere else but we didn’t take any notice, so we decided to drive there. It’s a very confusing place to drive and we drove around in circles for a while before we worked out how to get to the orange route, only to find it is blocked off from cars. We had cooked our dinner in advance and thought we could eat it looking at the sunset over the canyon. Instead we had to find a parking spot which in itself was a challenge as this a very busy area as it’s full of lodges. We then had to grab everything we would need and be able to carry it, so no dinner! The sky had started to get overcast, so we knew there was a chance that I wouldn’t be getting any good photos, but we went anyway. Despite the weather, the colours in the photos turned out much better than the ones I took during the day.
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| a deer in the carpark |
On the way out we took the desert view road to the east and saw some great vistas which also included glimpses of the Colorado River.
Our mission today was to buy a gas bottle as the little disposable propane bottles that most people use only seem to last a few days. It took a few hours to find Camping World as the address is wrong, it says it’s in Flagstaff but it’s in Bellmont, which is about 28 miles down the road. We finally found it and got one but they don’t fill them. So we had to go back to Flagstaff to the U-Haul place to get it filled. So frustrating. We then tried to find a campsite that had been recommended to us, but failed. So it wasn’t a good day.
We ended up in a lovely state park that had a river running along the side. There were warnings that this was bear country, but we didn't see anything more than a squirrel.
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| Oak Creek Canyon |
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