Grand Canyon 2004: Day 1

Down the South Kaibab to Phantom Ranch


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Our Crew: L to R Jani Radebaugh, David O'Brien, Oleg Abramov, Catherine Neish, John Keller, and me, Jason Barnes at the South Kaibab trailhead.
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The South Kaibab is fastidiously maintained so that mules can ride on it safely. Unfortunately this also means that annoying marathoners can run on it without breaking their necks or falling thousands of feet to their death, so they're always running by you like its a track meet.
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Some cliffside trails heading away from Cedar Ridge.
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The rim is colder, so it receives more rain and has less precipitation than the bottom of the canyon. Thus it has these trees on it whereas the vegetation is more Tucson-like once you head down.
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Looking westward alond the South Rim.
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At bottom you can see the trail out to Plateau Point, which we took on last year's grand canyon hike.
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That line going from bottom-left to upper-right through the saddle is the trail.
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The Vishnu Schist, lying below the Great Unconformity, are hard, metamorphosed rocks more than 1 billion years old.
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Looking down at the black bridge over the Colorado River that was constructed in the 1930s.
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Jani on the bridge.