AZT Diary

Thank you, Mitzi!

A special thank you to Mitzi, who went out of her way to drive into the centre of Flagstaff, which is not even where she lives, to buy two surprise beers for us at the Weatherford Hotel, where we had a reservation. They were waiting for us behind the bar when we arrived tired and thirsty that evening. Thank you!…
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  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff
  • Russell Tank to Flagstaff

Russell Tank to Flagstaff

Water, water and water. That was what we spent most of the seconds of the minutes of the hours of this part of the hike thinking about. We set out with a swimming pool worth of water: 15 litres - all we could physically carry. We thought we had it all worked out and some extra water to get us…
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  • Backwards (Tusayan to Russell Tank)
  • Backwards (Tusayan to Russell Tank)
  • Backwards (Tusayan to Russell Tank)
  • Backwards (Tusayan to Russell Tank)

Backwards (Tusayan to Russell Tank)

Sometimes I guess you just have to go backwards to go forwards... We set out from Tusayan with 12 litres of (heavy!) water and 10 days' of dehydrated food. The first day took us through beautiful pine forests, past a pair of elk hunt scouts with an elk bugle and a hunter camp and landed us in a beautiful camping…
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  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim
  • Rim to Rim

Rim to Rim

After 3 days hiking and camping across the Grand Canyon, we finally popped out unglamorously in a South Rim car park late yesterday afternoon, coated from head to toe in dust, like volcanic explosion survivors, after 25.7 miles, having hiked from the Grand Canyon's North Rim. It may sound like we didn't get very far in 3 days, especially given…
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Kaibab Lodge to Grand Canyon’s North Rim

Someone who works here told us that, if we were ever feeling down in the future, Grand Canyon's North Rim is where we'd want to be transported to. This is no overstatement. We hiked down and up the more touristy, lower elevation, South Rim 2 years ago (coincidentally also on our anniversary - the 21st will be our 5th) and,…
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Jacob’s Lake to Kaibab Lodge

Total "horny" toad count since we set out: 14 Deer sightings: 20+ (all doe) Snake count: 1 x 0.5m pencil-thin grey one (which I didn't see until it slid away to avoid my boot) Grub worms: 1 (bluish in colour, because it was eating earth to extract nutrients, according to Glenn) Too-recent-for-comfort mountain lion deer kills: 2 Places with AT&T…
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The first few days

The first few days

As Glenn put it, we should change the name of this trip to the Everything Hurts hike... The night before we set out on 9th Sep, we went to town taking even more gear, which seemed essential only a few hours before, out of our packs to try to get them to the point where we could put them on…
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Not much out there

Looking out of the 19-seater Great Lakes plane from Phoenix to Page last night, which roughly flew over the areas we're going to be walking, the lack of lights highlighted how much wilderness there is out there. Roll it on!
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Heavy stuff!

After frantic packing, repacking, re-repacking and enforced separation from my tripod and a lot of other camera paraphernalia, we finally reduced our backpacks to a weight which we thought wouldn't actually crush us on the first day. My pack without water now only weighs a whopping 40.8 pounds (18.5 kg), but we do have painkillers... and I'm really excited about…
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Arizona Trail, here we come!

The Arizona Trail (www.aztrail.org) is an 800-mile backcountry or wilderness trail crossing the state of Arizona from the Mexican border in the South to the border near Utah in the North, hauling itself over 8 passes above 9000 ft (3000 metres) and passing through only two towns.  Most people hike the trail in Spring in this direction (South-North), but as…
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