Made it through the work week, hurray! Have to take the Jeep in tomorrow for its 9000 mile check up, and have lots of housework to do this weekend, though. The kids are going to wrestling camp down in Columbus, Ohio for a week, and i must make sure everything they need is clean and packed...

Day Seven

Got up around 5AM or thereabouts to see sunrise over the Canyon. Tried to wake up/find the others, but was not able to, so set off for the Rim alone. I was pretty sleepy, and luckily Dan did wake up after all, because he found me wandering through the woods, heading in the wrong direction!

Enjoyed sunrise, taking tons of pictures. When the sun was well on its way up, headed back to Maswick, hoping to have better luck finding/waking up the others. Dan went to check on the kids and Danlo, and I headed over to try to find John. The light was on in his room, but he wouldn't answer the door, so I was a bit perplexed and sat down for a bit (I was still somewhat groggy). After a couple of minutes he came walking up with an armload of shirts from the gift store. Apparently he had gotten up even earlier than I had, and we had missed each other at the rim. We sat together for awhile and quietly talked, then set off to find everyone else.

We finally collected everyone, and ate breakfast at the lodge. Then we walked over to the rim, found a quiet place, and had our memorial service for Stephen C. and Shadow Lurker. Danlo read one of Stephen's journal entries, and I read Variol Son's tribute to Shadow, breaking down in sobs through the entire thing. It was fitting that we had this at the Canyon, such a sacred place to the native peoples of the area...

Then it was time to say goodbye to John, and that did kill me, as it always does.

After the departure of the High Lord, Danlo, Dan, and the kids headed down the Bright Angel Trail into the Canyon. They were planning on going down to the first of the three rest houses on the trail and then come back up. I walked along the rim for a bit, watched the birds and the tourists, and went shopping at the gift store.

When the fellows came back up, I treated them to ice cream. In the meantime, the rain had started up again, but this time it was good, because it made their climb back out of the Canyon much cooler.

Then it was time to head on out...and we saw a herd of elk grazing along the side of the road on our way out of the park.

Our next stop was Petrified Forest National Park. We got there at just about the time the heavens opened up with yet another big storm. We drove the scenic drive, and did pull over once to see a large concentration of the petrified trees. We took shelter under a picnic shelter sort of thing from the rain and the hail! Some of the trees had mineralized with semi precious gem stones, and shone wonderfully in the rain.

Our last stop for the day was in Chinle, closest town to Canyon de Chelly. We checked into our hotel, ate dinner, and crashed.