THURSDAY - It's time to bid farewell to the Grand Canyon National Park, but we're not actually leaving the Grand Canyon?
We're moving 133-miles north today, to a campground "down" on the Colorado River, the same river that carved out the Grand Canyon. That means we're going to have to decend nearly 3800' feet in elevation before we arrive at the Lees Ferry Campground in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.
Lees Ferry is where nearly all of the rafting trips through the Grand Canyon begin. Other than watching all the excited rafters beginning their adventure downstream, there is plenty to do right here and within an hours drive of Lees Ferry.
We plan to share all of that with you here!
TRAVEL DAY PHOTOS
After exiting at the East Entrance gate of the National Park the road begins it's long decent.
This is the Little Colorado River Gorge, a tributary of the Mighty Colordao River.
All of the roadway we're traveling today is located on the Navajo Nation Reservation.
There were many photo worthy sites to see along today's route.
Still decending but getting nearer our final destination.
Those are called the Vermilion Cliffs directly in front of us.
Here we are approaching the Navajo Bridge that crosses the Colorado River.
The OLD Navajo Bridge in the background is now a pedestrian bridge, more on that later.
Leaving the highway and turning onto the road that leads to Lees Ferry.
Our first look at the campsites, I think we're going to like it here.
Standing at the back of our campsite we have a view of the Colordao River below.
Our friends Rod and Sharon, who we met in Alaska last summer, are already here as they arrived yesterday. We were able to snag one of the First-Come-First-Serve campsites just two campsites away from theirs.
We are planning a big Easter Day feast with them on Sunday and something "extra special" next week that I don't think I've mentioned here before. Don't ask, I'm not telling!
FRIDAY - We have a lot to see and do from this location, and as we've only planned to visit here for 4-days, this morning we got right to it in the sightseeing department.
Horseshoe Bend is only about 4-miles from this campground (as the crow flies), but we'll need to travel nearly 40-miles of roadway to get there.
I'm sure most of you have seen professional aerial photos of this natural 270° bend in the Colorado River, but let me tell you it's nothing like being here.
HORSESHOE BEND
Before arriving at Horseshoe Bend we had some pretty dramatic scenery to drive through.
We gained back nearly 1600' feet in elevation to arrive back on the canyon rim.
Slicing through this rock wall saved about 10-miles of further travel around it.
There is a ¾-mile trail that leads from the parking lot to the overlook at Horseshoe Bend.
It starts out pretty boring and it's all downhill.
Once you come around a bend in the trail things start to get a little more interesting.
Of course with interesting comes the crowd of people.
At the trails end you have this spectacular view of Horseshoe Bend.
For a lot of people that's not enough, so they fan out to both sides of the protective fencing.
A little bit later the shadows have receded at little bit more.
Look at all those people just feet from the edge.
A look back over our shoulders as we hike back "uphill" to the parking lot.
While we were out enjoying this morning at Horseshoe Bend and stopping at Walmart to pick up the last of the Easter dinner necessities, Rod and Sharon were back at the campground taking care of another, more important task.
There are really only 4 of the 54 campsites here at Lees Ferry Campground that have a front row, unobstruted view of the Colorado River down below and this morning one of those sites will be leaving after exhausting their 14-day limit.
Rod and Sharon have already spoken to the couple that are leaving and have made plans to move over to the vacant premium site the moment they leave this morning.
Now we'll all have this wonderful view to share for the rest of our time here.
Sharon maintained her long standing family tradition of preparing latkes (potato pancakes), homemade cinnamon applesauce, and peas, for her and Rod's Good Friday dinner.
Lucky for us, she invited Tricia and I over for dinner too.
SATURDAY - Today while I sit here in
THE POD and begin writing this blog post, so I don't fall too far behind, Tricia, Sharon and Rod are out doing a hike
somewhere in the park.
Turns out they decided to hike the Spencer Trail here at Lees Ferry. The trail starts at an elevation of 3134' and peaks at an elevation of 4659', that's a gain of 1525' over a rather short one-way distance of 1.9-miles.
Tricia would probably never attempt a trail like this on her own and I'm certainly in no shape to try and join her. So I'm glad that Sharon and Rod are both avid hikers and Tricia was able to experience this hike.
Sharon and Rod are aspiring to average 100-miles per month this year. They are a little below the mark so far this year due to poor weather conditions, but I'm sure they'll pick up the pace now that springtime temperatures have returned.
So Tricia is safe out hiking with them, I just hope they give her time to stop and take a few photos on the way, so I'll have something more to share with you.
THE SPENCER TRAIL
GLEN CANYON NATIONAL RECREATION AREA
Here's Rod bringing up the tail end of the 3-man expedition.
It's a long way back down to the parking lot!
So many different colors to be found in this mountainside.
There's still more trail up ahead.
This bend in the Colorado River in where you'll find Lees Ferry.
A chance photo of Rod and Sharon during a pause for refreshments.
The Vermilion Cliffs are so much more than just red.
The humble beginnings of the Grand Canyon and the North Rim out on the horizon.
Getting nearer the summit now!
What's that post in the ground up ahead?
That's the summit of the Spencer Trail. Yeah, Tricia made it!
Just because you're at the top doesn't mean there's no more to see.
Like this mini-sized horseshoe like bend.
Even with the sun going down there's still some nice relections in the water.
🐰 HAPPY EASTER SUNDAY 🐰
Today all of our sightseeing will be done from ground level.
There a four locations in the immediate area of Lees Ferry we intend to explore today, and the first up is a scene we've seen before, but this time we've decided to pitch in and help.
For eons rocks have been tumbling down from the top of Vermilion Cliffs to the floor below.
Some times they come to land on top of one another...
...and sometimes they end up precariously balanced. We could use some HELP HERE!
The second location is known as the Navajo Bridge. Today both the modern day bridge constructed in 1995 and the original constructed in 1929 stand next to each other. The only difference between the two are strength and width, the height and length are nearly identical.
NAVAJO BRIDGE
Original bridge on the left and the new and improved bridge on the right.
The Colorado River as it flows under the bridge.
You can see the mud swirling around just below the surface.
Opposite side now looking back over the nearly twin bridges.
The original bridge was two lane and only 18' wide, the new bridge is 44' wide.
Another reason to check out the bridge is Califonia Condors and frequently hanging around.
No one ever say "Pretty Bird" to these guys.
Two tagged adults and two untagged juveniles. We saw as many as ten condors here today!
The third and fourth locations are right down at the original Lees Ferry homestead site.
Lees Ferry has changed ownership and purpose several times over the last 150-years. The original site had only two buildings and a ferry that at the time was the only way to cross the Colorado River for hundreds of miles.
When the original Navajo Bridge was completed in 1929 the ferry business dried up overnight. The land was sold and new buildings were constructed nearby and run as a "dude ranch" for early pioneer vacationers. That eventually went bust and it was then used as a private residence until being sold to the United States government and became part of the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.
Today restoration is underway of the ranch and the orchard is being cared for by the National Park Service. When the fruit trees are in season each visitor is permitted to harvest a five gallon bucket full of fruit to take home for personal use.
In the orchard you'll find apple, apricot, fig, nectarine, peach, pear, plum and quince trees.
LEES FERRY AND THE LONELY DELL RANCH
Welcome to the International headquarters of Lees Ferry, Inc. Just kidding!
This is what's left of the Lees Ferry business office.
This building breifly served as the Post Office and then a bunkhouse.
The entire Lees Ferry complex.
Nearby was the Lonely Dell Ranch location.
This was a cabin built for one of Lees two wives, he was a Mormon polygamist afterall.
This building was constructed to use as the "dude ranch" by the second owners.
A look at the rather large private orchard on the property.
They sure must have ate a lot of fruit.
These pear trees are in bloom and the bees were busy doing what they do.
Now that our sightseeing is all done for the day it's time to start preparing for our Easter Dinner.
Tricia is in charge of the vegetable portion of today's meal. She offered up some Roasted Parmesan & Garlic Asparagus and Baby Carrots plus a Green Bean Almondine.
Rod and Sharon provided a delicious Honey Baked Spiral Ham and Steamed Sweet Potatoes.
Not shown is the dessert I provided, a dozen freshly baked Peanut Butter Fudge Brownie Bites, straight from the bakery at Walmart. Before you ask, there were none left by the time our campfire died down at 9:00PM. In other words, "We had a feast"!
What a great Easter holiday we shared with Rod and Sharon while visiting Arizona.
MONDAY - We stayed up a little bit late for us last night, add in the fact that we now have plenty of dishes to do and I don't have the blog post ready to go this morning and it makes perfect sense that we should just stay here for an extra night instead of scrambling around to be off this site before the check-out time of 11:00AM.
We don't have reservations at the next site, we still have plenty of fresh water to last another day and we're no where near our 14-day limit for staying here, so this morning I went and put another check for $10 in the Iron Ranger and now we're all set.
I'm happy to report that as of 2:47PM today
THE GANG'S ALL HERE!
You may remember Winston and VerJean from our travels in Alaska last summer, well today they arrived here to join us at the Lees Ferry Campground.
They've arrived just in time to move with us tomorrow to our next location and join Rod, Sharon, Tricia and I on that "extra special" activity we have planned.
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