It's the Journey

It's the journey, not the destination... most of the time.

I am getting home from a hike down the Havasu Indian part of the Grand Canyon. There are beautiful waterfalls there in an absolutely gorgeous canyon.



I have seen many beautiful things in nature along my life's journey. This was one of them.

They say it's a 3,000 ft descend in 10 miles but my GPS said 13+ (due to multipath, which is the bouncing of satellite off canyon walls... more on that for another blog).

This is about half the altitude-feet of the park's South Rim's Bright Angel trail... with more miles, thus easier (but that's for another blog too).

The journey?

The way we went was assisted by an outfitter that carries down tents and food via mules. I still carried a twenty-something-pound pack.

Most of the time, I backpack ultralight... self-contained, simple and rough... and I like it that way, but glamor camping (glamping?) is a terrific luxury option. I have experienced it on hut-to-hut circuits at the White Mountains, camp-to-camp at the High Sierras, at LeConte in the Smokeys, Len Foot Hike Inn at Springer Mountain and many others.

But there's a new level of glamping... by helicopter!

The destination?

Now, I do sometimes believe that the end justifies the means... let me get it done my way... but not this time: People helicopter to Havasu and back out. Groups of hobby photogs do that. Even NatGeo did that.

Depending on your purpose, that could be cheating.

I will never again look at a beautiful wild NatGeo picture of Africa without asking: Did they just helicopter there?


- copyright 2014 by Willy