John Annerino - Hiking the Grand Canyon: A Detailed Guide to More Than 100 Trails

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Text, photographs, pullout map, and glossary copyright 2017, 2006, 1993, 1986 by John Annerino

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without the express written consent of the publisher, except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles. All inquiries should be addressed to Skyhorse Publishing, 307 West 36th Street, 11th Floor, New York, NY 10018.

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Hiking the Grand Canyon is dangerous and too often has proved deadly. The author and publisher accept no responsibility for any injury, loss, or inconvenience by any person using this book.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Tom Lau

Cover photo credit: Copyright John Annerino

Historical Photo Credits: Edward S. Curtis, George Wharton James, John K. Hillers, Emery Kolb, Timothy H. OSullivan, Robert L. Carson, Frederick H. Maude, Henry G. Peabody, and E. W. Murphy from the Library of Congress, GCNP Museum, and USGS John Wesley Powell Collections.

Print ISBN: 978-1-5107-1498-4

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-1500-4

Printed in China

For my father, who sacrificed it all to move our family west to our new life in the Grand Canyon state; for Ale and our family; and for the Canyons first caretakers, the Native Peoples, who trod its trails long before me: Hopi, Hopitu Shinumu, Navajo, Din, Kaibab Paiute, Kaipapici, Havasupai, Havsuw Baaja , Hualapai, Hwalby, Apache, Nd , Yavapai, Yavap , Mojave, Makhv, Zuni, Ashiwi , and others: We are still here.

Contents

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Publisher Tony Lyons, Editorial director Jay Cassell, and editorial assistant Ronnie Alvarado at Skyhorse Publishing. This new Commemorative Hikers Edition of Hiking the Grand Canyon would not have been possible without their foresightedness. I also want to thank John Beckman, Peter Beren, Jim Cohee, and Helen Sweetland, who, while at Sierra Club Books, shepherded the first three editions of my Totebook guide to Hiking the Grand Canyon . Im grateful for the editors, associates, and friends who inspired me to keep exploring and photographing the canyons of the the Great Southwest: Mel Scott at Life magazine; John Rasmus at National Geographic Adventure; Donnamarie Barnes at People magazine; Kermit Hummel at W. W. Norton; Kathy Springmeyer at Farcountry Press; and Lucinda Bush, Chris Keith, Richard Nebeker, Donald Bayles, Jr., and the late Robin Lange for their support. Many other people, associates, and friends accompanied me, inspired me, or shared their real-life expertise to teach me about the Colorado River, Grand Canyon, and Colorado Plateau: boatman geologist Michael Young; outdoor programs director Craig Spillman; Havasupai and Hualapai river guides Archie Matuck, Jessica Powskey, Delbert Havatone, and Denny Wescogome; boatwomen Suzanne Jordan and Louise Teal; boatman Wesley Smith, Western States 100 sub-twenty-four ultra-runner Michael Thomas; runner Theresa Ebarb, who continues to inspire me; the late Grand Canyon anthropologist Robert C. Euler; and professor Galen Schnell, who first introduced me to the Canyon by leading me down the Boucher Trail. Thank you.

No matter how far you have wandered hitherto, or how many famous gorges and valleys you have seen, this one, the Grand Caon of the Colorado, will seem as novel to you, as unearthly in the color and grandeur and quantity of its architecture, as if you had found it after death, on some other star; so incomparably lovely and grand and supreme it is above all the other caons Yosemite, the Yellowstone, the Pyramids, Chicago, all would be lost if tumbled into the Grand Caon could put a dozen Yosemites in its vest pocket.

John Muir, 1901
Conservationist and Sierra Club founder

Hiker, Angels Gate, North Rim.
Copyright John Annerino Photography.

PART 1

Welcome to the Grand Canyon, the Greatest Canyon on Earth

Preface

Inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and as the most spectacular gorge in the world, crew members of NASAs Expedition 39 took the first iconic photograph of the earthly marvel from the International Space Station on May 12, 2015. When Apollo 17 astronaut-scientist Harrison Jack Schmitt first stepped on the moon forty-three years earlier he said, Its like trying to describe what you feel when youre standing on the rim of the Grand Canyon. During his terrestrial visit to the South Rim of Grand Canyon on May 6, 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt was so moved he proclaimed:

In the Grand Canyon, Arizona has a natural wonder which, so far as I know, is in kind absolutely unparalleled throughout the rest of the world You cannot improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it. What you can do is keep it for your children, your childrens children, and all who come after you, as the one great sight which every American should see.

Since Grand Canyon National Park was established on February 16, 1919, more than seventy-five million American and international tourists heeded the Rough Riders call to see the Canyon. In a recent record-breaking year, 5,520,736 American and foreign tourists visited the Grand Canyon. They traveled across the nation and from around the world (Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, Denmark, England, France, Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, Spain, and Switzerland) to stand in awe on the brink of the Canyon. Unaccounted tens of thousands day hiked below the rim; 44,801 backpacked for an overnight stay below the North and South Rims; 24,885 rafted the Colorado River (more than 500,000 river runners to date); and 150,000 rode scenic air tour flights. Beautiful to behold, the Grand Canyon is 277 miles long, ten to eighteen miles wide, 6,720 feet deep at its most profound point, and eroded through two-billion-year-old rock layers about five to six million years ago. Encompassing 1,904 square miles of the Colorado Plateau, the Grand Canyons many secluded areas remain dangerous terra incgnita for unwary foot travelers in the twenty-first century. Since records were first kept in 1867, 687 hikers, river runners, and visitors have died in the crown jewel of Americas natural treasures.