Marvelous Miracle -- Grand Canyon Village joins the 20th Century

While MMG and I really enjoyed the drive from Lake Powell to the Grand Canyon, the high point of the day was to find that GCV now has cell towers!! They are well hidden, but unlike every previous visit here where we were forced to use pay phones and pay $.25 per minute to access the internet at the resort hotels or drive to a small town just outside the park to get a wifi signal, we now can use our cell phones, and thus access the 'Net with the Verizon air card, nearly anywhere in the Park.

For the map fans, the drive today was south from Lake Powell on US 89 to AZ 64/US 180, then west into the Grand Canyon National Park! 146 miles, 21.6 gals., 6.7 mpg. Mileage hurt by altitude increase from Lake Powell's 4100 to the Grand Canyon Village's 7000.

The trip started with a climb to about 6000 feet, then a quick 1000 foot drop along the side of a cliff to the plateau through which the Colorado River flows, starting what will be the Grand Canyon.

The following video illustrates the problem with trying to photograph the scenery out here. It was made from a pullout about half way down the cliff. The plateau floor stretches out there for more than 50 miles. The dark line out in the distance is the Colorado River Gorge. The nearest mountains are over twenty miles away. If you can see the road in the near distance with the toy trucks on it, your seeing over 5 miles out and down.




Once down on the flat and headed south, we went through many miles of real desert, some of which would rival, if not exceed, the famous Painted Desert, in terms of colors and contrasts. We'll get some pictures of it for you when we retrace that part of our route next week on our way to Bryce Canyon NP.

After we got the moho settled in and hooked up, we went out to see the eastern end of the Canyon.

Here are a few pictures of what we saw. Keep in mind the bottom of the canyon is about a mile down and the other side of the canyon is more than 11 miles away........ Remember to click on the photos to get a larger version!

MMG insisted on this! That's the famous Desert View Watchtower in the background. Click on the link to read more. It started out as an artist's concept of an Anasazi watchtower built in 1932, but has taken on a fame and history of it's own.


Looking in the Canyon east from the Watchtower. The green ribbon winding through the center is the Colorado River more than 2 miles away -- about 1 mile straight out, then 1 mile down!


Study of colors and shadows. 11 miles across the way is the North Rim of the Canyon.

A couple of pictures looking west about 25 miles down the Canyon as it fades into the sunset.

Speaking of fading into the sunset, it's bedtime here.

Our love to you all.

MMG and DDG