One Week in the Canyon – Through the Water in the Sky (Day Four)

Fearless leader George and the clouds that greeted us on day four.

To borrow from corporate jargon for a minute, talking about Grand Canyon Weather is impossible to cover underneath one umbrella. The South Rim commands a weather system entirely its own, while the North Rim operates damn near like its own mountain range, routinely picking up feet of snow the South Rim never sees as storm systems move north from the warmth of the Gulf of California. The bottom of the Canyon’s floor, meanwhile, often operates completely independent of what’s going on up top of both.

It’s all still very much the desert, though. Rain, and moisture of any kind is rarely seen, with Phantom Ranch on the Canyon’s floor barely averaging 10 inches of rain per year.

My backpack has a rain fly. My hiking shoes were waterproof. I brought a rain shell and a pair of pants that were ‘water resistant.’ My tent, obviously, had a rain fly. I’d done the bare minimum to be completely prepared for the event of rain, but I was by no means ready when waking up on the morning of our fourth day to the repeated pecks of water drops on my tent at Hance Creek.

It was a cavalcade of small things that began to signal this day would not be like any other. The morning routine of back-cracking and the stretch-every-muscle-known-to-mankind within the confines of an ultralight tent was the first conundrum, as I tried my best to keep my drys dry with the steady rain outside. Once dressed, it became a game of Tetris to pack a wet rain fly into an already full backpack without soaking anything of importance, a backpack that began day one overflowing with everything I’d need to complete a week in the Canyon.

It was cold, too. A dense fog/cloud had descended from the rim to the shelf, leaving an occasionally eerie backdrop to what views we did have while obscuring others – often the ones off the edge of precipices that now looked to have no bottom at all.

It was a reality both George and I knew and prepared for, but it’s worth mentioning here that we had no cell service at any point since our descent below the South Rim on day one. No texts, no tweets, no weather updates, no radar. We knew before first setting foot on the trail that there was a slight chance of some rain at some point deep into our trek, but it both never looked too serious and its ETA had changed from day to day in the run-up to our departure. It was raining steadily, we could observe, but we had no frame of reference for how long it would stick around, or in what capacity.

Today would be our first full day on the Tonto Shelf, one that would keep us on the thousand-foot shoulders of the Colorado River while flanked constantly by the massive upper walls of the South Rim. In theory, there would be no walls to scale, no huge ups or downs, and a day spent working our way in and out of side canyons and drainages with the River – and the temples and rock monoliths under the North Rim – treating us to landscapes unfound anywhere else on the planet. It would lead us around Horseshoe Mesa (and our easiest potential bailout point up to Grandview Point at the South Rim), up around Cottonwood Creek, and eventually into the steep recess of Grapevine Creek for our next camp.

Today would also be wet. We’d be wet, the rocks we stepped on would be wet, and the usual finely ground dirt would be mud. On a day where we’d be steeped atop some of the tallest cliffs in the canyon, I’d find myself staring at my shoes on more steps than I’d care to recall. All that over the course of nearly 11 miles.

We began to wind our way around Horseshoe Mesa and back towards the River, peeling back west as we crept towards Cottonwood Creek. Cottonwood was full of running water even prior to the storm, which meant that while we were also mostly hiking on relatively flat land along the Tonto Shelf, we could also roll with less water weight for once, too.

Perhaps it was the lighter packs that propelled us. Perhaps it was the simple need to keep moving to stay warm, as little did we know at the time that the storm had sunk the temperature low enough that the rain we were getting below the rims would be capping the North Rim with inches of snow the rest of the night.

After watering up at Cottonwood Creek, we bent back around the far wall of its side canyon and headed once again back towards the River and the main gully of the Grand Canyon itself. This stretch, though, was near the end of Granite Gorge, a carving the River left behind through ages of granite rock that left ~1,500 foot cliffs in its wake. Quite simply, looking over them was both the most glorious and terrifying portion of the trek to date, the added worry of tumbling off the edge adding to the literal meaning of breathtaking.

The rain began to intensify as we finally made our way towards the mouth of the canyon carved by Grapevine Creek, the side canyon where we’d be calling home for the night. Not to be outdone by Granite Gorge, its cliffs were just as imposing, as was the false adrenaline rush that kicked in as we veered south into that canyon’s entrance.

It was nearly two full miles to the back of the side canyon before we reached the creek’s edge and a spot to water up and camp. So, any and all initial joy of having ‘made it’ when we reached the canyon’s mouth quickly dissipated as the rain’s intensity continued to escalate.

We worked our way to the back of the side canyon, and to the area where a well-stocked flow of Grapevine Creek greeted us. Several flat ledges on small bluffs above the creek looked as if they’d be excellent spots to set up, and over our shoulders looking down canyon towards the North Rim had views of each of Wotans Throne, Krishna Shrine, and Vishnu Temple. Of course, puddles were the current occupants of each tent site, and we were reluctant to even attempt to get a makeshift camp set up while the rain continued to pummel us from above.

So, we found the one petulant little tree that had managed to make it out of the dirt and desert and into existence along Grapevine Creek, hugged it, and huddled for some two full hours while waiting for any break in the constant downpour. At some point just after 5 PM, we lucked into about a fifteen minute window where we could scramble to get our tents set up, and set them up we did just before the next round of water came showering down on us from above.

I fired up my stove in the tent vestibule that evening, as one is not supposed to do. I cooked dinner in it, ate dinner in it, and tried my best to re-read what I could of Edith Hamilton’s Mythology to pass the time. I wrung out every inch of clothing I’d worn through the sop that day, and did what I could to hang it so it would dry as best it could while contained within my tent-bubble for the evening.

For those that don’t know, there are no non-stove campfires allowed under the rims of the Grand Canyon. The rain on that day made even trying for one moot in that particular instance, but there would also be no ‘make a fire tomorrow to dry things out,’ either. Frankly, it became the huddle of all huddles, and fortunately my Nemo tent was up for the challenge.

(Wet socks and skivvies ^)

What I did not do very well at the time came back to bite me firmly in the ass as soon as it could, given the chance. With little desire to venture out of the relative warmth of my sleeping bag and tent into the storm, I made a conscious decision to not drink nearly as much water as I normally had, and certainly should have. The hike itself was punishing to the point of needing more water than you’d ever imagine, as were the desert conditions despite the storm around us. Still, I stubbornly didn’t want a pee-induced natural alarm, as I was beyond exhausted and wanted to sleep as long as physically possible.

The next morning would remind me how poor of a decision that was, a decision nearly as poor as having polished off the last of the wine the night before at Hance Creek. It was a long, cold final night of having my body work the way I’d intended.

You can read Part Five of this weeklong trek through the Grand Canyon’s Escalante Route here.