The Grand Canyon

As I mentioned yesterday we were going to the Grand Canyon by train today.  Let me explain how this came about.  The first RV trip we did in the States we had a small RV and were able to get into the State RV park at the Grand Canyon.  This time having a 38 foot RV, we couldn't get into the same park, as they have a limit of 30 foot or less. The private park at the Grand Canyon was full, so we had to make another plan.  In Williams, which is 65 miles south of the Grand Canyon, the Xanterra Resorts owns and runs a train that runs from Williams to the Canyon in the morning and returns in the afternoon, plus they own the hotel and the RV park.  This does 2 things, it keeps the number of vehicles entering the park down and it enables more people to visit the park by traveling on the train.  One in six people in Arizona are employed in the tourist industry.

We were very disappointed that we could not get a reservation in the park, but after today's experience, we were very happy we coulldn't get the reservation.  We walked across to the station at 8.45am, started the day with a good old fashioned cowboys show, with many laughs to loosen up the crowd.  At 9.15 we boarded the train and started our journey at 9.30.  It was a really relaxed and enjoyable journey.  Each coach has a PSA (Passenger Service Assistant) who gives the passengers info along the way.  The trip is 2hours 15minutes.  Some people did the coach tour at the Canyon, but Dirk and I decided we would rather do our own tour.  So we walked the Southern Rim.  I had made sandwiches for lunch, as we remembered the last time we were here it was very difficult to buy lunch and now with the time restriction it would be worse.  We walked half way, found a bench with a view and sat down to have our lunch and then continued a little further, before turning round to come back.  We had intended on catching the shuttle back to the train, but we were enjoying the walking and the scenery so much, we ended up walking all the way back to the train.

We were celebrating our new health, with no smoking and new knee.  In total we walked 5miles (8km) at an altitude of 7000 feet.  Thank goodness we come from Johannesburg, otherwise we would have really suffered with the thin air.

The train left the Canyon at 3.30pm with a train load of very tired, happy people. So needless to say we had to have the cowboys robbing the train when we were nearly back in Williams, just a little bit of fun to end the day.

Although we have been to the Grand Canyon before it was still a fantastic experience, still a WOW moment.  A great day was had by the happy travelers.