Day 4: Glendale, UT to North Rim of the Grand Canyon

Summary:
    Miles:   262
    Average: 51
    Maximum: 91

Roads:
    89, 9, I-15, 59, 389, 89, 67

Tuesday morning I learned from the KOA manager that the man in yesterday's motorcycle accident had been flown out to a hospital, but was in very bad shape and might not survive. I hope that he recovers.

More sight-seeing. I went south and stopped for breakfast, then headed west (yep, west!) to go through Zion Nation Park. Zion is very impressive. Great rock formations with lovely colors. The biggest problem for me was that all of the pull-outs were slanted in such a way that parking the motorcyle and taking pictures was difficult. As a result I didn't get nearly as many pictures as I would have liked.

I continued west after leaving Zion and headed to I-15 to go south to St. George. I needed to pick up chain lube and a tire pressure gauge. St. George was HOT with the temperature right around 100 degrees. I stopped for a quick lunch and then headed back north to pick up route 59/389 which would take me to the north rim of the Grand Canyon. When I first hit this road I was afraid that I'd made a terrible mistake. The road was climbing steeply and I was following an 18 wheeler, a motorhome and a fifth wheel trailer. There was nowhere to pass and it looked like I was going to be stuck moving at 20 mph for quite a while. Fortunately the road came out on a plateau and the speed limit jumped to 65. I quickly passed the traffic :) and after that I rarely saw any more than one or two vehicles at a time.

I arrived at Jacob Lake around 3:00PM and went to the Grand Canyon visitor center to find out about camping. The only campground open in the park was full. The other campground in the park is closed all year for restoration. I could have camped in the national forest or at a USFS campground. The elevation there is about 8,000'. I asked the lady behind the counter what the overnight temperatures were like: "right around freezing the last few nights"! That was all I needed to hear - there was a motel right next to the visitor center, so I wandered over to see if I could get a room. I could, in a small (very small!) cabin. However, at least I would stay warm that night.

As I still had several hours of daylight left I decided to go ahead and ride out to the north rim. What a great road! Highway 67 is lovely, running through alpine meadows surrounded by big, green pine trees. There were plenty of wild flowers in the meadows, too. The traffic was fairly light and really kept moving right along. There were numerous pull-outs for taking pictures or just stopping to enjoy the view.

The north rim of the Grand Canyon is very scenic, very lovely. The canyon itself is a very large hole in the ground :) Actually, I found it a bit too big. It is really hard to get a sense of scale or perspective. Zion is much better, in that sense, as you are closer to the formations and can appreciate the size of the formations.

The ride out of the park on 67 was even better than the ride in! The light was softer as it was later in the day, there was no traffic at all and the temps were down into the low 70s. So, I rode out at a moderately brisk pace and enjoyed the scenery.