Route 50

Route 50. Great Basin, Nevada. (Click image for full-size view.)

I used to think pictures like this were doctored, somehow impossible. But this is really what it looks like. Except it's better to be there. I've driven this road twice now, and I'm ready to go back again.

Grand Canyon, 50 years later

Bright Angel trail, Grand Canyon south rim, 2016.

Fifty years ago, my parents started a series of summer trips that eventually took us all around the country. The highlight of our first trip, in 1966, was a hike to the bottom of the Grand Canyon via the Kaibab trail. We stayed overnight at Phantom Ranch, and hiked out the next day on the Bright Angel trail.

My daughter graduated from college last spring, and we drove back home to California, stopping to see some sights along the way. The Grand Canyon was a must, as she had never seen it, and I haven't been back. We drove in the back way, along the Little Colorado, which is pretty spectacular on its own.

The Bright Angel trail looks pretty much the same, and the exhausted (but exhilarated) hikers look familiar. We want to come back and hike from the north rim to the south rim.