Day 8 - Flagstaff to Phoenix via The Grand Canyon
354 Miles
On Day 8 we toured the Grand Canyon, rode back down to Flagstaff and on to Gilbert, AZ. The words which best describe the Grand Canyon are "Awe inspiring!" Add to that me getting to meet our most recent granddaughter for the first time and the day was top of the list!
We left out of Flagstaff and rode up 89 toward the South Entrance. It was a longer way, but when have people heard me complain about taking a longer route? Denise rode with Alex and family so I was all by my lonesome on the way up to the canyon. This was them following behind.
This route worked out though in that we were able to check out several points, starting with Moran Point to the east, and then working ourselves west to Grand Canyon Village. I'll post all of the scenic pictures below. As usual, they don't do the scenery justice. The coolest photo anyway was of Alex and our granddaughter at a scenic viewing point. Isn't she cute?! Ahhhhhhhh.
We sweet talked Christy into letting her older daughter ride with Granddad through the park after the second stop and she had a blast!
Finally we made the trek to Gilbert. It was cool (temps) down to and through Flagstaff, but once we passed Flagstaff the temperature climbed to the 90's and settled at 106 as we got into Phoenix. It actually felt cooler when it dipped to 102, but it climbed back to 104-106 several times. We watched four different thunderstorms in our path as we went south, but we were able to thread the needle once again! On top of that, Alex saw a "Haboob" (a giant dust storm that comes before a rain) as well, but luckily it never hit us. Oh, and the final temperature of 102 was after the sun had set (about 20 minutes out from the finish). Needless to say, we won't do a lot of daytime sightseeing on the bike over the next two days.
Well, that's it for today. We're going to hang low until Tuesday when we travel back up to Sedona by way of Prescott. We've got a very good friend of a very good friend to do lunch with and then we do a leisurely ride on to Sedona. But that's a story for another day.
What's in the brush?
