Yesterday we decided to head east a couple of hundred miles to Flagstaff AZ. Our base for the next couple of days will be Camp Navajo which is operated by the Arizona National Guard. When we arrived I missed the turn into the campground and ended up down a pretty rough road before I conceded that I must have missed the turn. Eventually we found the camp and got the next to last spot available.
After lunch we decided that a quick trip out to the Grand Canyon would be a nice way to spend the afternoon. We are lucky to have the flexibility to just drop into the Grand Canyon on a whim. On the way there we were trying to remember how many times we have visited the Grand Canyon and we believe that today was the fifth trip to the south rim, and we visited the north rim once.
They are starting to open up more of the facilities but the visitors center is still closed, and a lot of the restaurants are operating as take out only. The only Park Service people we saw were a maintenance crew working on one of the bathrooms. The signs said masks were required but only a small percentage of the visitors were wearing masks.
The other big difference was the lack of foreign tourists. Usually as you walk along you hear a lot of different languages as the Grand Canyon is one of the highlights of a visit to the US for overseas tourists. Today it was overwhelmingly American English being spoken. Covid has caused Americans to rediscover the national parks. Hopefully we will be able to share the Grand Canyon again soon with visitors from overseas.
The canyon itself was magnificent as usual. It is really an awe inspiring place and I could be happy visiting it daily.
Two observations about traveling. The first night of the trip the sunset was at 8:38 we looked it up, tonight driving back from the canyon at about 7:00 I told Ton it looked like the sun was getting ready to set, I was right. We have traveled far enough south that the days are two hours shorter than in Oregon. The sun set at 7:32 today. Yesterday we were at sea level where the temperature was 101f, tonight we are at 7000 feet and the high temperature is 72f. What a difference in conditions a 200 mile drive in the same state can bring.