We began Day 2 of our journey by waking at 4am and leaving Cottonwood Campground at 5:40am. Our first stop at 6:40am was Ribbon Falls, 1.6 miles down the trail. Ribbon Falls a great place to spend some time on a hot day when camping at Cottonwood, and we originally thought we go on a day hike to the falls on Day 1, but it was too hot, so we decided to stop along the way to Bright Angel Campground on Day 2.
We didn’t spend much time at Ribbon Falls due to the heat, and many warnings from multiple rangers that hikers want to get through “the box” as early as possible. The Box is a narrow passageway where vertical walls of black schist (rock) rise 1200’ high, and if it’s the heat of the day, it creates an oven-effect where the temperature reaches 130-degrees or more. Given we think 80-degrees is hot :-) we made a concerted effort to get through the box early, and arrived around 8:15am, and in fact, were shaded by the 1200’ walls of schist most of the time.
A couple miles later at 10:30am, we were greeted by 3 grazing deer as we arrived at Phantom Ranch (Bright Angel Campground, where we stayed, is ½ mile past Phantom Ranch).
So Day 2 was a fairly easy 7.2 mile hike and 1600' elevation change.
Note ~ if you do this hike, there is no drinking water between Cottonwood Campground and Phantom Ranch.
1 comment:
You guys do the hiking and the picture taking, we'll watch!
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