Grand Canyon Exhaustion

After a long 14+ hour car ride from Texas to Arizona, one stop at a Holiday Inn, and several stops at gas stations, a Subway, and my Mom's Great Uncle's Apple Cider Shop, we finally reached our destination of our cousin's house. It was great to finaly get out of the car after being stiff from driving for hours. Our cousin's moved to Arizona from Texas a year ago, and we haven't seen much of them since. As soon as we pulled up the curb they ran out and gave us huge hugs. They gave us a tour of their house, and it is beautiful. There is a pool in the backyard, overlooking the mountains in the background. The neighborhood is all uniform in the architecture of the homes and it looks really nice. But, enough of the house. We've done a ton since we got here.

We've been swimming a lot in their pool. We've walked all up and down their sidewalks to their local Walmart, their outdoor mall, the skate park, the swingset, Taco Bell, Blockbuster ... all over the place. They complain that their town is small, but they have no idea how much there really is to do here. The place is so clean and perfect.

Then yesterday we packed up AGAIN for another mini-road trip to the Grand Canyon! We packed light and hopped aboard their travel trailer. It was really relaxing to be able to walk around and actually DO things while someone is driving instead of sitting in the mini-van like I'm used to. I played a lot of Pokemon: Leaf Green on the ride over there on my Silver Nintendo DS Lite. I was just about to beat Lance, one of the final fights in the game, when the battery died ... awesome. It really sucked, but then we played a lot of Nintendo 64 that they brought, mostly the mini games on Pokemon Stadium.

Finally when we got there we climbed out of the travel trailer and raced across the street to see the Grand Canyon.

Before we get to the sight, let me clear something up. The Grand Canyon isn't anything like you see on the movies. I mean, it isn't nearly as easy to get to as they show. Like, on a few movies I've seen, people are just driving along the highway and then out of nowhere they pull up to a sight seeing spot on the side of the highway, and they're the only ones there. That's not at all how it is!

We had to wait in our car in line, pass through a gate, pay $25, drive 10+ miles after the gate, and then find a parking spot. It was pretty packed. There were a lot of Europeans. You could tell because they were wearing kapris with really big shoes.

After we raced across the street, through the forest, and to the guard rail ... I saw it. The Grand Canyon. It was much more than Grand. I felt like I was staring into an abyss of space. An endless expanse of enormity. I felt so insignificant, yet so motivated to make the most out of my life. It was astonishing. I can't describe to you how beautiful it was. It almost looked like a backdrop in one of those old movies because there was a little dust in the air. It was even more gorgeous at night. That night we went out to the Watchtower to look at it at night time with a full moon in the air. It was peaceful seeing the enormous canyon surrounded by the luminous glow of the moon with the river of air flowing over you. I'll never forget seeing that.

We went to another stop and we saw that there was a trail that you could go down if you wanted to. Me and Ben (my brother) decided to head on down it a little ways. We had been walking down into the canyon for about 10 minutes when we decided to turn back. We started heading back up the canyon when my cousin Karlee came bolting down the trail laughing and eager to comtinue our descent. We were overwhelmed by her excitement and decided that we should keep on going down the trail. This was a bad idea.

We went down and down, turn after turn after turn, left, right, down, slide, shortcut, red stone, brown stone, bridge, dust, dirt, small path, narrow path, turn, turn, slip. Ben took a poop break, we saw a stink bug on the path, and we saw a bottle of pee.

We walked down that path for very very long time. We had passed a few markers saying that we had gone down almost 4 miles. We had no idea that we had been walking that far. We looked across the canyon and saw that we had completley changed 'mountains'. We were on a different cliff than we originally were. It was silent. The only noises that we heard were the constant clicking noises of cicadas. It was serene.

A young couple passed us and told us of some mines that were ahead, and it boosted our confidence and we continued our way down for another turn or two. Then, thank God, we passed an elderly man with his son. He asked us if we were planning on camping in the canyon. We were wearing t-shirts, jeans, and Vans shoes. We didn't have any water, tent, or any form of camping supplies. We told him that we weren't planning on camping, and he suggested that we head back because there were only 2 hours of daylight left! It was a real wake up call. We'd gone down way to far, without water, without a full stomach, without a good nights rest, we needed to get up to the top again.

I think that man was there for a reason. If he hadn't told us to go back up who knows how far down we would have gone. We could have died from dehydration or exhaustion. The climb back up took twice as long, and we took several breaks to rest our legs and catch our breath. Karlee (my cousin that went with us) was bright red, and I was afraid that she was about to pass out. Needless to say, after a grand total of 3 hours, we completed our journey. At the top of the path my mom and uncle were waiting for us and my cousin Valerie brought us fresh ice water. Whew, we survived. On the walk back to the camper we passed several warning signs telling people the danger of climbing that path. We must have missed those somehow ...

That night we had a fire and talked with eachother and grilled hamburgers and hotdogs. Me, Ben, Karlee, and Valerie camped that night in a tent that me and Valerie built. Me and Val got the warm sleeping bags and Ben and Karlee were stuck with the cheap ones. It was a windy night. My Dad is flying back to Texas today, and I won't see him for about another two weeks! I'm going to miss him.

Alright, well right now I'm sitting with a laptop on a couch while we're watching "Charm School with Ricki Lake" on VH1. Gosh this show is terrible. Goodnight everyone, thanks for reading.

Going to Start Our Trip!

Hey everyone. I'm Noah and I blog. It's going to be interesting meeting new people on here, and reading all of your interesting stories that you will share with me. I will explain myself later, but for now I have a lot to blog about.

Today we're leaving for our 3 week trip to California! It's about 9:30AM, and my bag is almost completley packed. I just need to add a few more shirts and then I should be good to go. I've got my Nintendo DS, a couple movies, and my Zune ... I should be entertained enough for the 20 hour drive from Ft. Worth, Texas. Hopefully this trip will be pleasant, with two baby brothers sometimes people get a little restless.

I should probably get finished packing my bag before my Mom starts hollering that it is time to go. Leave me any messages or comments, I'd like to get to know everyone! I'll give you all more details about myself later, right now, there's no time! See you all. :)