After camping on a beach on the Colorado River just east (upstream) from the mouth of Clear Creek, we climbed a rugged, steep ravine to get to the Tonto level at the top of the Inner Gorge of the Colorado--a climb of over 1000 feet. At the top of the ravine is a "bowl" created by erosion through the Tapeats Sandstone level of rock that is the top of the Inner Gorge and the base of the Tonto. After the ravine, we had to climb out of the bowl to be on the Tonto and therefore to be able to hike around The Howlands Butte to get back to our base camp at Clear Creek.
After picking a route that appeared to be able to take us to the top of the bowl, I saw a vertical crack in the Tapeats a couple of hundred yards south (closer to the Colorado) from our route. Doug agreed to try it and see what's on the other side, thinking maybe it would be a shorter route to the top of the Tonto. Well, it wasn't. It lead to a dropoff of over 1000 feet, all the way down to the Colorado and Clear Creek. But we were not disappointed: the ledge on the other side gave us spectacular views of the Clear Creek Trail, Zoroaster Temple, Clear Creek near the Chockstone Falls, the Colorado, the South Kaibab Trail, The South Rim, and much more. The really spectacular thing about such a view is its size: it's too big to photograph or even describe. I can tell about all that we could see, the pieces of the view, but it's impossible to tell how that view felt--so outsized that perception races to circimference it. Another feeling that was always in the background of that huge view is that we had climbed all of it with our own feet (and hands, at times). We'd climbed down from Bright Angel Lodge to Bright Angel Campground. Then over the Tonto to Clear Creek, then down the creek to the Colorado, then up the rugged ravine to the top of the desert again. You get to know this land only off the trails; then you begin to feel intimate with it. Here are a couple of photos from that part of the trip: first one of Doug on the way up to the eye in the wall.|
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More to come... |