I was there this year. I never desired to see it but I was “in the area”. It’s insane, it really is. You’re 7000ft above sea level in a big flat plateau that goes for a hundred miles in every direction. And then there’s this huge, 1 mile deep, 7 mile wide trench in the ground. I did a light hike of about 1 hour down and 1.5hrs back up from the south Kaibab trail. Now I’m no trail runner, but I do a decent pace. I made it most of the way down into that white layer near the top. Through the brown/green and through most of the white, but didn’t touch red. An hour of cliffside zigzag to not even really be in the canyon. I probably could have made it to the cedar point in the red but I didn’t want to help the Rangers reach their annual rescue goal
I was there this year. I never desired to see it but I was “in the area”. It’s insane, it really is. You’re 7000ft above sea level in a big flat plateau that goes for a hundred miles in every direction. And then there’s this huge, 1 mile deep, 7 mile wide trench in the ground. I did a light hike of about 1 hour down and 1.5hrs back up from the south Kaibab trail. Now I’m no trail runner, but I do a decent pace. I made it most of the way down into that white layer near the top. Through the brown/green and through most of the white, but didn’t touch red. An hour of cliffside zigzag to not even really be in the canyon. I probably could have made it to the cedar point in the red but I didn’t want to help the Rangers reach their annual rescue goal
I always admire the rim to rim hikers
Then you find out the rim-to-rim record is under 3 hours. That’s 21 miles of horizontal with -7kft and then +7kft of elevation.
Insanity.