We crossed the Silver bridge and hiked along the river for awhile. The sun was coming up and it accentuated the blue-green of the river and the white sand of the beach and I thought about how so few people get to see that sight- it was really beautiful!
You hear so many horror stories about the hike up Bright Angel- some say it takes 2-3 times as long as the hike down- which would put us at a miserable 12 hours! But I think we got really lucky with the weather- it was really cool and much of the trail is shaded- so we finished in 7 hours (which is great because we had planned for 10 hours). We took a 30ish minute break at Indian Gardens but other than that we didn't stop for long breaks too often.
Before Indian Gardens the trail is mostly flat. You go through a nice shaded plateau along the river and creek beds but then after Indian Gardens it's almost all uphill and it's mostly switchbacks so the scenery doesn't change. The hike wasn't as physically challenging as I expected but I could have done with an occasional change of scenery- not that the scenery that was there wasn't breathtaking! But what made Kaibab so interesting to me was that it was totally different with every turn. After Indian Gardens, Bright Angel was pretty much the same vista just smaller and smaller with each mile up.
I was worried about my sunburn on the way so I tried to wear my fleece as long as possible but that only lasted an hour or so. I kept slathering on sunscreen and luckily it didn't get any worse but I have a pretty great farmers tan.
A few advantages of Bright Angel over Kaibab are that it has water and more bathroom stops- two necessities during hiking! Once you get closer to the top there are significantly more tourists just taking a quick hike. I'll never understand how someone can hike in jeans, a leather jacket and converse!
Pro tips for the hike up:
- wear a long sleeve shirt! You will burn much easily on the way up and/or down. Next time I'll bring a long sleeve wicking/breathable shirt.
- EAT. Even if you're not hungry- I started crashing towards the end and I'm sure it's because I didn't eat enough. Bring nuts or raisins or something that's easy to eat with one hand while also carrying trekking poles.
- listen to music. I think this helped me immensely. It's easy to get very discouraged after you've been going up endlessly for hours and you still can't see the top. Music is a great motivator.
- don't bring the sack lunch from Phantom Ranch. It's really heavy and you probably won't eat most of it. In fact, one day's lunch was enough for two days for me.
- stay two nights at Phantom Ranch if you can. There are some great day hikes around the area or if you want to relax and do nothing it's great for that too! Most of the people we talked to were only there for a night which surprised me.
