First Day of the Grand Canyon - Bright Angel's Trail

We started around 7:45 am, and it was overcast and cold out. But the clouds were lovely. At the top of the trail there was a lot of ice and pine trees. It was crazy to watch them fade into sand and cacti. You travel through so many different kinds of environments so quickly when you hike the Grand Canyon.

We took the Bright Angel's Trail down 4.6 miles to Indian's Garden (the green pictures at the bottom). The full 9.2 miles was absolutely exhausting. If there is one thing I came away thinking about the Grand Canyon, it is that the canyon is bigger than I could have ever imagined. The canyon hikes were not as "pretty" as some of the other hikes we did, but it is definitely impressive and majestic.

Julia is smiling because we have just started our assent. She doesn't yet know the pain we're about to experience. The view below is just part of what we had to hike up. We made it back up in about 3.5 hours, but it was probably one of the hardest things I've ever done.