So last night in our tent lovingly borrowed from Joe and our last campground in America…at least this time round! We packed up and retraced our journey back up the 89 with another stop at Dessert View on the way.

We had been booked into The Lake Powell Resort courtesy of Ryan who we met earlier in September hiking in Mount Hood. His mother-in-law works there and they sorted us out with some friends and family discount. Thanks Ryan and Paula! With a stop in Page and the Glen Canyon Dam we arrived at Lake Powell at around noon but we couldn’t check in until 1pm. When we did we had room number 666! Good job neither of us are superstitious! We booked a table at the restaurant and enjoyed some of the spa pool action! The sun was in and out and we’d already driven through storms and hail stones so it wasn’t the best afternoon for a sunbathe but we wanted to take advantage of our accommodation!

Later we enjoyed a meal at the restaurant, it’s a good location due to the views over the lake but the food was a little overpriced and the quality could be upped somewhat, we were in and out of there in 45 minutes!!

The next morning we had been booked onto a boat tour again thanks to Ryan and Paula! The tour is one of the classic things to do on the lake whilst visiting the national park as most attractions are best seen on a boat tour. It was again chucking it down when we set off at 7.30am, we didn’t have high expectations and the first part of the tour was mostly poor visibility but eventually we arrived at some sights. Due to the rain there were many waterfalls forming on the canyon rock which is very rare for the area. We took turns to go on the top deck, some people getting drenched in their hoodies! The star attraction of the park is Rainbow Bridge, a natural bridge formation in the rock, it looks amazing on a sunny day and didn’t do too badly today either. The only problem was we couldn’t hike very far as the paths were river-logged. Others marched on through the water in their trainers but we didn’t fancy this!

After around 30 minutes we all got back onto the boat and had a further 1.5 hour journey taking in more sights throughout the lake, canyon area. We even enjoyed some sunshine later on. It is a really beautiful area but we have to say that we probably would have enjoyed it more with better weather. The tour got in nice and early for us though so we made tracks for Phoenix as soon as we could.

It took a further 4.5 hours to get to Phoenix through more rain and thunder storms, moody skies and bright sun bursts created an array of rainbows! When we got to Dave’s place (Helen’s cousin) we set off straight away for a bite to eat down the road and then back at his lovely house with a glass of red wine. Home comforts!

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)

We were up fairly early, enjoyed our usual breakfast; fruit, cereal and yoghurt, packed up the tent and our belongings and set off on the next part of our journey. It took around 5 hours to reach the South Rim of the Grand Canyon with a few stops along the way. Our route from Zion took us out of the north exit of Zion National Park, along the 89 and 89a to  rejoin the 89 and exit onto the 64 which took us straight towards the Grand Canyon Village. We noticed many native American stalls on the road side as we drove, of which over half were empty, a sign of the times.

Our first stop at the Canyon was along the East Rim Drive at Desert View. We had lunch and took in our first proper views of the canyon in the Watchtower, a building built to fit in with the landscape… kind of! Inside are some really interesting wall murals and to be fair the views were amazing. Moving on from Desert View we made our way to the Mather Campground where we had booked to camp for 2 nights at $18 per night.

After setting up the tent we drove out to Pipe Creek Vista and picked up the yellow shuttle bus to Yaki Point. We stayed here until the sun set, photographed, meditated and joined in with the fellow onlookers. The canyon turned from red, to yellow to blue over the course of time. On our way back we picked up some supplies for dinner at the Market Plaza and then enjoyed our first showers in 3 days!

The following morning we were up early and ready for a hike. We had looked into a few options for hikes down into the canyon and knew that making it to the canyon floor in a day and back out again was out of the question (and not advised by the rangers). So we looked at day options and chose the Hermit’s Rest trail so we could enjoy the views and hike without so many tourists. This time we drove into the village and took the red bus shuttle to Hermits Rest. The trail down is steep and we would only recommend it if you have some hiking experience. In the heat and at this time of year we were still advised to take more water and food than normal. It took around an hour and a half to reach the Santa Maria spring where we logged into the trail book, enjoyed some rest and then continued for a further mile before having lunch and making our way back up. It actually took less than we had anticipated at around 4 hours total hike but again it was steep and getting back up out of the canyon was tough. We endeavor to come back and do a 3 day hike down into the canyon floor and out again sometime in the future!!

Not satisfied with the 7′ish miles we continued to walk along the rim for a further 5 before getting back to the car in the village. This was to be our last night of camping in America, so we enjoyed more camp food, showers and an episode of Peep Show (we have been religiously watching and downloading all series since we have travelled!).

(Leica M9, Summicron-M 50mm f/2.0, Leica 90mm f/2.8, Zeiss 18mm f/4 ZM processed in Lightroom 3)