To the bottom of the Grand Canyon and back via the North Kaibab Trail

Happy 35th Anniversary! A while ago Paul and I made a "bucket list" of things we wanted to do before we are too old. One thing on the list was to hike rim to rim in the Grand Canyon. It has seemed to be a complicated thing to somehow have a car waiting on the other side for us, so we decided we would just do it a different way. We would hike down one side and back up and then another time, hike down the other side and back up. Isn't that the same, only different? Any way we decided the weather is perfect at this time of year for one stage to be done, so why not do it for our anniversary? We left here Friday afternoon about 3:30 and arrived at Jacob's Lake for dinner at 5:30. We stayed in one of their old fashioned lower rated rooms and watched a movie on Moss and Christie's portable DVD player. We got up at 5:00, ate breakfast, packed up and were at the North Kaibab trail head and started our hike at 6:58 am, just as the sun was rising. It was pretty cold, about 12 degrees, so we had on our layers: shirts, jackets, gloves and I had my trusty earbags. We headed on down and enjoyed the beautiful sunrise. It wasn't long before we could start un-layering and by the time I got to the first bridge, Redwall Bridge, 3 miles in, I was down to just my long-sleeved shirt. (One dumb thing to start out was that I had two right legs for my zip-offs so had to wear my jeans for the hike). We headed on down taking some extra time so as not to kill our knees. The only people we saw were a couple coming up. They had started from the South Rim at 1:00 am in the morning and were doing a rim to rim to rim trip in a day. Crazy! As we got close to the bottom of the canyon, we saw more people who were coming over from the other way to see some of the sights en route. We enjoyed the views at Roaring Springs, but didn't hike right over to it. We moved on to Cottonwood Campground (nice spot) and then past Ribbon Falls (really beautiful even from the trail) and on to Phantom Ranch, which is really cool (and has super nice restroom facilities), then to Bright Angel Campground (very nice spot) and on down to the Colorado River and across the Silver Bridge. We arrived there, 14.2 miles, at 12:38 pm. We had hoped to make it by 12:00, but were OK with the extra time. We stopped and washed our feet in the icy Colorado, had lunch, filled up our Camelbacks, and headed out for the return trip at about 1:30. There were lots of people staying at the Phantom Ranch and Bright Angel Campground and lots of folks out on the trail, that we visited with en route. We saw two guys who were running the trail rim to rim to rim (42 miles) coming both ways and they seemed to be doing great. We also saw the couple from the morning coming back still going strong. The scenery is amazing all along the whole hike with so many different kinds of rock, deer, the Bright Angel creek, etc. The temperature was perfect. We got back to Cottonwood Campground, 21 miles for us so far, about 4:30 and ate a snack. Coming back out was definitely going to be a challenge from here on out. We got to Roaring Springs about 6:00 pm and ate another snack and put on our headlamps. Only 5 miles to go...the hardest 5 miles I've ever done. We were feeling it and were very happy whenever we came to a more level section and could make some time. We had to stop quite often to catch our breath. As we got closer to the top, stops got quite frequent, but not so much to breathe as to gather a little energy to pick up one foot and put it in front of the other. There were some people coming out behind us that we could see by their headlamps. We stayed ahead of them until the last .75 miles when the first one caught up with us. It was a group of 4 guys doing the final leg of their rim to rim to rim hike which they had started about 4:30 am that morning from the North Rim. They were doing well, but were a little slower coming out than they had hoped. One said he was really looking forward to a big cheeseburger when he got out! The last couple of miles were really killer. If there was anyway I could have gotten out of doing them, I would have taken it. I was so tired I could hardly lift my feet over the water diversion rocks in the trail. We were so glad to get to the parking lot and especially when our car started. The battery was having trouble with the cold weather and we were a little worried about it. The 4 guys said they would wait and make sure we could get it started. We got there about 15 minutes after they did, at 9:30 pm. It was about 19 degrees. Coming out we were using so much energy that we didn't feel the need for coats, but did put on our gloves for the last little bit. I jumped in the car, turned on the seat heater, put all the coats over me, drank my orange juice and fell asleep and pretty much didn't wake up until we got home. If Jacob's Lake had still been open, we probably would have spent another night there. Paul was a trooper and drove us home with a couple of rest stops...we just had to leave the car running in case the battery wouldn't do the job. Did we enjoy it? YES! Would we do it again in a day? Probably not. 28+ miles is just a bit more than I need with such an elevation change. Is it beautiful? YES! Very much a Grand Canyon. Happy 35th and one crossed off the bucket list!