The climb out of the Thunder River trail started out easy enough at a nice reasonable grade. The bottom section had some tough spots but the middle section was easy and followed mostly contour lines with just the occasional switchback to get up to the next rock layer. The top section of the trail was steeper and had considerably more rubble on it. At 7:30 or so I was out and back up on the ridge overlooking the side canyon. The morning was gorgeously clear and sunny as was typical of most days at Grand Canyon.

After a good rest I headed west on the Thunder River trail to the next obstacle, the Redwall ascent. It was a beautiful morning for a walk across Surprise Valley and I was again astonished by all of the flowers that were in bloom. Shortly after 8:00 I reached the junction of the spur trail heading over to Deer Creek and about 15 minutes later the junction with the Deer Creek trail itself. Somewhere around 8:30 or so I started the Redwall climb which was relatively easy. I was through the Redwall shortly after 9:00 and proceeded through the rock layer above that to the rim of the Esplanade. In most areas of the Canyon the Supai formation sits directly atop the Redwall but in Surprise Valley there is another layer between them. Maybe that's the surprise... and I thought it was the flowers.

At 9:45 I was back on top of the Esplanade. The temperature seemed to have dropped quite a bit and it was a lot cooler and breezier than it had been down below. I took a short rest and continued on. The trail continued to rise somewhat for he next 1/2 mile or so as it climbed up to the top of Esplanade proper. Around 10:15 or so it finally levelled out and I began looking for a good place to camp for the day. It's great to get all of the hiking done in the morning and be where you want to be early in the day. I followed the trail for maybe a mile more before I found the spot I wanted.

The area that I finally decided to camp in had some very oddly sculpted rocks. I don't know if they were sculpted by wind or water or a combination of both but they were very strange and made the landscape look quite eerie. After setting up camp and stashing my food I made myself some lunch and sat back and relished in the view. Shortly after I finished eating the couple from Seattle strolled on into my humble camp and we just sat around and talked Canyon talk for a while. They were heading for the Thunder River trailhead tomorrow and were going to camp somewhere near the junction of Thunder River and Bill Hall today so they still had a couple of miles to go. After a good rest and chat we said our goodbyes and they headed off. I cleaned up from lunch and sat back and read for a while.

I got bored with that after a while and decided to go exploring. I got out my daypack, threw some stuff in it and wandered off. I was thinking of trying to head out overland to the other side of Bridger's Knoll to see if I could get a glimpse of Tapeats Cave and Spring. This was not to be. I managed to follow the bed a drainage all the way to the base of Bridger's Knoll but there was nowhere to go after that because of all of the cryptobiotic soil that you're not supposed to walk on. Sometimes it's tough to be green but rather than damage the landscape I turned around and headed back down the drainage. I would have to get my kicks some other way.

From the vantage point that I was at I could see the tops of many of the sculpted rock formations and they began calling out to me. That looked harmless enough as it is after all pretty hard to damage a rock just by walking on or climbing it. I also encountered the most beautiful cactus blossom that I have ever seen in the process. This thing was just the most vivid shade of red that I have ever seen and was growing right of the side of one of the rock faces. The view from the tops of some of these rock formations was spectacular and the top surfaces themselves were quite intriguing. Many had little sculpted bowls in them that would fill with sand and soil and things would spring to life in them. They were like little oases surrounded by rock.

After wandering around for a few hours more I headed back to camp and prepared to settle down for the day. I was bummed when I went to cook dinner and found that there was no more gas left in my stove. It seemed fine at breakfast. Luckily I still had enough food with me so that I could get by. I would just have to wait until I got back out to the rim and back to civilization to have lunch tomorrow. I ate dinner, sat around and did some more reading and watch nightfall come to the Grand Canyon. It was a spectacular sunset, the first one that I was really able to see since I started this tip. On all of the other nights the sun disappeared over a cliff long before it actually set. Tonight I got to actually see it set. It was marvelous.