Solo to Indian Gardens

I waved goodbye to my friend Norman, the man with the Zebra Truck, as I crossed the long steel bridge over the Colorado River. The sun was high in the sky, and I still had at least another six hours of hiking. If all went well I would reach the South Rim of the Grand Canyon by 9 pm, having left at 5 am this morning. I quickly rounded the corner out of sight to re-adjust my backpack once again. It had become severely uncomfortable once again, and re-bending the metal support hadn’t worked. I didn’t want Norman to see that it was still bothering me, we both had a long ways to go and he didn’t need to worry about me. He had already given me a bag of skittles for the switchbacks up, his trick for getting young kids through a hike. I was also given $10, which I wouldn’t have taken except for the fact that I really needed it.

I through the bag high on my hips and let it hang loosely off my shoulders to relieve my back a bit. I had put on a blister bandage on my heel, which was much worse than I would have thought. I also put a bandage on top of that and stuffed the new heel hole in my shoes with a bit of bandage wrap.

Exhausted already, I had to stop numerous times to re-adjust bags and bandages, and to cool down in the shade. I found myself waiting until a cloud would blow over the sun, when I would dash into the next bit of shade and wait again. I never stood still very long, but in less than a minute I felt refreshed just enough to keep myself going.

I was following the mule trail, you could tell by the hoof prints and waste remnants. For about 2 miles I followed along the Colorado River before turning into a slot canyon to the South. A small stream followed along, which gave me a small peace of mind. As you probably know, water is scarce in the desert, and would be the number reason people don’t make it out.

Slowly the sun began to fall below the rim of the canyon, and cooled it in an instant. There were a few river crossings, but as I learned on the first, I had so little balance due to the heat it was pointless to avoid getting my shoes wet. I wan’t too pleased about getting my nice shoes mucked up, but I was too tired to care or even remember that they already had a hole in them.

Occasionally I would check the GPS to see just how much further I had to go. It made me feel great knowing exactly where I was, or at least less not feel as if I were lost. I hadn’t seen a single person since I left Phantom Ranch, and it didn’t look like I would.

For a long time I walked in a kind of limpy fashion, up and up I went, convincing myself that it was that much less that I would have to climb later. The trail opened up onto sandstone cliffs, and revealed an incredible view of the canyon, river, and the many miles that I had left behind. Occasionally the sun would peak back onto the trail, a striking contrast of heat to the mild air of the shade. The dry desert scrub began to turn into lush vegetation once again. It was similar to that around ribbon falls, except for it stretched vastly beyond my eyes reach. The desert began to come alive as I began to notice birds, reptiles, and insects once again.

Finally, nearly four hours later, I came upon a sign that pointed me towards Indian Gardens. The place was well named, it certainly did look like a garden in the desert.