Day 3

Today we were going to hike in the canyon so of course we needed a good breakfast. We went down to the Bright Angel lodge and guzzled coffee and ate eggs and potatoes and such. Our waiter didn't have us do any signaling much to our disappointment but our water girl was pretty funny. A ton of the people who work at the lodges are from different countries and this girl was from Thailand. She was as cute as she could be. She was obvi real excited to be learning english and of course needed to know cool phrases. So we overhear her asking the other waiters what "chill" means. Except she pronounces it "cheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeel" Presh.

Anywho it was time for us to hit the Bright Angel Trail. We were off to a slow start because the Koin Bros Studio was right there. They were having an exhibit I guess on paintings of the Grand Canyon so we had to check em out. They were all actually very nicely done. Mell gets the win though...his was delicious. Anywho we got to walking again (this time for good). Now I've done a solid amount of hiking in my day and I'm used to hiking up to the top and then making my way down. Not here...you start  the top, hike down and then back up again. There's all sorts of warnings about hiking thru at the park saying it's a lot harder than you think it is yada yada yada don't try and go to the bottom and back up in one day blah blah blah. These warning were not wasted on my because I've seen the Grand Canyon episode of I Shouldn't Be Alive. Anywho I start flying (I have no concept of pacing myself hence I don't run) down the canyon. The trail is pure dust so there's a cloud of it following us. We passed people who are huffing and puffing like no other on their way back up. Right now I'm thinking they're being slightly dramatic (I may or may not change my mind later) Walking down into the canyon I started to appreciate it even more. I could see so many more angles of it than I could at the top. While we were hiking this guy sort of joined our group. We got to chatting and guess what? He's awesome! He's doing a cross country road trip by himself. He started in PA and has been all sorts of crazy cool places. I sure do love people with spirit.  

We made it down to the first little shelter/rest stop which is idk a couple miles down (easy peasy). We headed off trail just past that and hung on a rock on the very edge. Um talk about awesome. I kicked my shoes off and soaked it in all its glory. It was scrumptious. I was really hoping I could nap out there all day and maybe some nice man in a helicopter would pick me up in time for dinner. Since that obviously wasn't going to happen, I laced up my kicks and started truckin towards the top. We go a decent amount before the blazin sun and my lack of pacing catches up so we found some shade and had a drink. We ended up having to make quite a few of these stops. They weren't lyin...it is harder than you think. The sun was beating down something fierce so a cool shady rock was the prime break location. I was amazed at what some people thought was a good idea to wear hiking in the Grand Canyon. Sure there were people in awkward real life clothes, some in lil canvas shoes, others in big baggy gangsta jorts. But my fave had to have been Mr. Trendy himself. Homeboy was wearing BLACK SKINNY JEANS, vans type shoes, and a sweet tank (I'm thinking American Apparel). I applaud you sir, for not letting the heat or the canyon get in the way of your style.

Anywho we are getting closer to the top  and I'm sweating like no other. All I wanted to do was take my clothes off. But considering the amount of people (from various cultures) and all of the dust, i decided to persevere clothed (bleh). Well we made it out (finally) alive and cooled off before lunch. Who cares what I ate for lunch. I sure didn't. All I wanted was an ice cream cone. When we came out of the canyon everyone was licking their gian ice cream cones just mockin gme. So after lunch I sprinted (okay I walked) to get a cone of espresso chip. OMG it was everything I had hoped and dreamed. All of this sugar gave me the strength to go souvenir shopping. We collect mugs from the different places we go and we've been talking about the prospective Grand Canyon mug for weeeeeeks now. For some reason we were under the impression that they would have the best mugs of all time. WRONG. They wer all pretty fugly. Now I know you're probs calling us mug snobs but seriously their selection was lacking. After pacing in front of the mug rack for a solid 10 minutes we finally decided (settled) on a lil green mugh. We then went back to the lodge for a much needed stretch out on the bed.

We wanted to watch the sunset so we scurried off to an early dinner. I had a buffalo chicken quesadilla. It was tasty and spicy. But anyways we went to start taking pics of the canyon and low and behold my dad had his camera with him but his battery was back at the room. Balls. There goes our fun. We tried to get back to our room to get it before the sun set but no such luck. Instead we watched a lil bit of DWTS (long enough to see Derek Hough) and American Idol. By now night had really settled in and the moon was HUMONGOUS  so we had to venture out and see what the canyon looked like. We beebopped on over to Yavapai observation point. Ahhh take my breath away why dontcha. The canyon was glowing like no other. We walked out onto this point to soak it all in. It was so quiet and peaceful. I don't think the moon has ever shone brighter. as bizzarre as this sounds I really wanted to dive off the edge (insanity). Once we could tear ourselves away we headed to get some dessert. we had our eye on the "Warm Apple Grunt"  since we arrived. Lemme tell you unlike the mugs, it did NOT disappoint. It was this lil bowl filled with baked apples and granola topped with a big ol scoop of vanilla ice cream. mmm goooood. I say it was worth missing Glee. Of course we had to see who won DWTS so we bebopped back to the room and made it just in time to see the winner (obvi it was derek)

To sum it up- Black skinny jeans are inappropriate hiking attire (even if it is trendy tuesday), seeing the grand canyon lit up by the moon may make you suicidal and warm apple grunts taste a heck of a lot better than their name.

P.S. Derek Hough, let's have dancing babies