Welcome to Grand Canyon National Park! We live about 20 miles away, tucked into Kaibab National Forest (along road 610). Luckily, we’ve been able to use Yoni’s rental car to drive the dirt roads into the park and have explored the grandest of canyons from several drivable viewpoints along the North Rim and from a hike on the Kaibab Trail.

The hike included a very challenging 3,000 foot decent, turn-around at a waterfall (who knew there are waterfalls in the canyon?!), and a grueling ascent. That’s a total elevation change of 6,000 feet and a length of nearly 10 miles round-trip! This may have been my longest and steepest hike and by the end I was feeling ecstatically proud but also in need of some foot rehab. Yoni felt similarly, happy but recovering from leg cramps. Yair continued to prove himself super-human by dancing and juggling along the hike and completing it with energy to spare.

Our home in the forest is wonderfully free and secluded. We have no neighbors and only a few cars drive down the dirt road near our site daily (usually forest or park service vehicles or off-road motorcyclists). It is very quiet and the sky is very clear – offering deep blues during the day and an unbelievable night sky. The Milky Way is so visible at night that it looks like the glow of city lights when the largest and brightest parts are near the horizon. But there are no city lights. There isn’t even the normal haze near the horizon – just straight black with twinkling stars all the way to the ground.

We are entertained by a woodpecker family nesting a tree hollow next to our RV and by herds of wild bison that move through the trees to open meadows. The bison are strange to behold and particularly mysterious at night when they move about, unseen but heard, surrounding us with deep groaning that can easily be confused with stomach gurgles. There are other creatures around: butterflies, chipmunks, weasels, ravens, and the Kaibab squirrel – a fluffy and long-eared squirrel that only lives here. We also happen to be camped near a trailhead which has made it easy to take off on long walks without needing to drive.

It’s an ideal place to relax and explore. The only problem is, again, our lack of connectivity. I have no phone service and our only access to the internet is miles away, inside the Grand Canyon National Park general store. I have a big list of things I want to do online and am looking forward to our upcoming stops on the way to Las Vegas where we will have internet access as well pools and hot tubs. Perfect timing as the temperature has started to creep up – getting into the 100s at lower elevations. Excellent weather for swimming.

And hiking with my flow wand in hand! Yair did two quick videos of me playing on the trail. Check them out here.