Blurb.....

Its hard to believe my time here at the Grand Canyon is nearly over... The summer just flew by! Its strange to think that I have so few photos or blogs for this time, and memories and experiences are so many!

Ever since I left New Zealand, I've had a difficult time re-adjusting to the American Lifestyle. I just needed to get back to Nature! It's hard when you make tons of friends and have the best time of your life... and then just leave it all behind. Its like I left my life. It was nearly 5 months of intense studying and 'adjusting' before I started this job. I MISSED MY FREEDOM!!!

Thank you David Willey, my boss, for giving that back to me! I am loving my time here at the South Rim of the Grand Canyon! I am hosting Couch Surfers, who are as happy to see me as I them! I've been on the prowl to find an albino deer that lives near me. There is a Great Horned Owl that lives near my campsite... I call him Earl. I don't know why.

One night he was hooting right by my tent for over 4 hours... I lye awake, and came up with that name for him. " Excuse me Earl... I'm trying to sleep!" I would yell at him. Haha, he got quiet. "Thank you Earl"... then he continued. Haha. I think he was telling me that I was a guest in HIS home.

I've been seeing many signs of Cougars around my camp site, including scat... and CS'ers reporting a "large animal" checking them out at night. Well... I teased them, but that cat decided to check out my tent while I was sleeping too. It put a paw up, about a foot from my head, probably playing with the tent material.

I was less concerned considering the food was in the other tent. But I'll tell you, I finally got the courage to sit up and shake my tent and yell at it "Hey get outta here". I didn't have the courage to open my tent and look, I really want to believe it was just my imagination. Well then the next night I spotted it crossing the road about a mile from my camp. Since, I've been told that I am directly by of the most concentrated areas of cougars in the park. Hmmmm... Here kitty kitty kitty...

I saw a set of ring tails (like a raccoon) when I hiked into the Grand Canyon a couple of days ago. The canyon was incredibly hot, about 150 F in the middle of the day. By 2am it finally cooled down below 90 degrees.