A Harried Trip to the Grand Canyon

April 21 ~ 22

White knuckles is the only way to describe the drive to the Grand Canyon. The skies were dark and the wind was kicking  up when we left Sedona.  But we pushed on.  Then it started to rain.  That turned to sleet and snow. The visibility was about 100 feet.  Serious accidents were everywhere.  Scared is the operative word.

Stop at a truck stop for about an hour…have some soup…trying to find a gap in the storm. Rick’s tracking it on his iPhone. He thinks a little respite is coming. We leave. It’s a bit better, but quickly gets worse.

There is nowhere to stop…not even pull off the road. We press on…..very, very slowly. Rick does as marvelous job of keeping us safe and we make it to the Grand Canyon Trailer Village and pull into a very snowy site. This is certainly a bare bones place, but its big selling point is it's a half-mile from the rim.  Next closest place with hook-ups is outside the park and miles away.

We hook-up real fast and race to the rim for our very first ever view of the Grand Canyon.

I’ve used up most of the superlatives for the sights of Sedona. But Holy Moley….even under cloud cover I understand the reason they call this canyon Grand! I really think some of the individual formations in Sedona are more striking, but the sheer expanse of this wonder challenges words.

Walk around a bit….check out El Tovar, the upscale hotel on the rim where we have dinner reservations on Sunday night. Then head back to Gigantor for a drink, an early dinner and an early evening. We’re exhausted.

Freezer Diving

I hate wasting food and find  no good reason for it….really great things can be put together with what you have. I call it “freezer diving”. I have vowed to use all the bits and pieces we have in our freezer and fridge before we get to Boulder in about another 10 days. It’s amazing what wonderful things you can come up with. Bought bunches of fresh produce in Sedona and will play Iron Chef with all the “secret ingredients” we have in the freezer!

Tonight was easy. Had a pork loin….marinated it in a hoison garlic sauce, stir-fried carrots and a bit of broccoli with some ginger and made some rice. Really good and simple.

Sunrise on the South Rim

Awake before dawn so we decide to go to the rim to view the sunrise. It is 24 degrees and we don’t have clothes for this kind of weather. Layer, layer, layer. Get to the rim……unfortunately the clouds are still hanging over the canyon…but we get one little shaft of light.

Walk for about a mile around the rim and are glad we are seeing the canyon in this weather…though, we are hoping it gets nicer sometime before we leave.

Tired and freezing, we go to the Bright Angel Lodge and order a big, belly buster, breakfast. Should have ordered one of their “Sizzling Skillets” and split it. This is Rick’s country fried chicken with gravy, eggs and potatoes! My corn beef hash and eggs was equally behemoth!

Back to Tor ...settle in to read the morning paper and wake up three hours later!  Feeling much better.

Still snowing, but decide to go back to the rim and see what we can see.......not much of the canyon...but is a treat to see some of the wonderful winter scenes that have been created.

Even though it's freezing, after that breakfast bonanza, we long for a salad for dinner.  Pull out leftover satay, sliice the meat, arrange on a big plate of greens and sprinkle with sliced scallions and peanuts.  When I originally made the peanut sauce, I doubled the recipe....for two reasons.  First so we'd have it around when we needed to make something quick, but mostly because doubling it used up a full can of coconut milk and a small jar of peanut butter.  Defrosted a little sauce, thinned it with milk and it made fabulous salad dressing.

Forecast for tomorrow is dreary.  Plan a trip of the "Desert View" drive...about 26 miles towards the eastern entrance to the park.