Thursday morning we awoke in a real bed, well rested. Our AirBnB was perfect for our needs - we failed to take pictures, but we had a lovely backyard to enjoy. Plus, the place had a washer/dryer, so we were able to get all of our laundry done (it had been over a week since we had access to laundry, so we were really needing to several loads of laundry). We spent much of the day relaxing, catching up on blog entries and enjoying having connection to the internet. After eating leftovers from last night's dinner, we eventually ventured out for dinner and groceries for our upcoming stint camping. After driving through lots of dusty locations, we needed to clean the surfaces in our car, reorganize and repack all of our gear. It was really nice to have this breather before heading out again.
Friday, May 2 - Again, we're up early on a transition day. We had to be up early to make sure we made our meet time to kayak the Colorado River. We were on the way at 6:20 headed north for a charge in Flagstaff. We got there, charged up fine, then finished our trip to Lee's Ferry. The scenery near Sedona was cool (again), as were the rock formations approaching Lee's Ferry.
Once we reached the river, we picked out our campsite at the nearby first-come-first-served campground and headed down to the river. We got a quick orientation and we were on our way. A motorboat took us and our kayak (2 person inflatable, also known as a divorce boat) about 10 miles upriver, dropping us off at a point north of Horseshoe Bend where we can hike up a bit to see petroglyphs. On the way we saw a bighorn sheep grazing and a few condors soaring above. (Unfortunately, we saw neither on our paddle back.) The petroglyphs were cool, and we walk back to our tandem kayak to head down the river. The river had a decent current, roughly 3mph when the river isn't wide. We soon reached river bend and continue paddling until we decide to pull over for lunch. We brought our lunch with us, so we pulled over on a beach to enjoy lunch with a spectacular view.
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| Lee's Ferry. From this point, we were ferried up the river to the Petroglyphs. This is also the starting point for expeditions down the river through the Grand Canyon. We saw several large dories (wooden boats with oars) and rafts loaded with lots of gear getting ready to make the multi-day trip down the Colorado through the Grand Canyon. |
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| We were ferried up the river, our inflatable kayaks on the back of this boat. |
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| Gorgeous scenery as we rode up the river - we were traveling on the section of the Colorado that is south of the Glen Canyon Dam, through Glen Canyon. Simply gorgeous and special to be able to observe this canyon that is only accessible by water. |
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| Male bighorn sheep that our boat captain said has been hanging out in this area for a while with a female and a baby. |
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| Petroglyphs named "Descending Sheep" for rather obvious reasons. These are still considered a sacred site to native people in the area. |
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| In contrast to the section of river we had rafted before, this section of the Colorado was very clear. We could see to the bottom in all but the deepest parts of the river. |
The trip down the river was beautiful and largely uneventful (flat water with a good current - only one Level 1 rapid). We saw quite a few ducks and 3 wild mustangs. We enjoy our paddle and make it down in a little under 4 hours, under the "shorter" time they say it should take us to get down. We took a few pictures on the way down but did not stop for any hikes along the river.
From there we headed to our campsite, arriving around 4pm. This seemed like the first time we've had lots of time at our campsite when it isn't cold and/or windy. We really enjoyed quiet time in the afternoon before grilling squash and a big ol' ribeye we split for dinner. We were surprised at how well the steak turned out since we so rarely cook over charcoal.
We stayed up a bit after dark to see the stars, then settled into the car for the evening.
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