I had a heck of a ride up to Flagstaff and the Grand Canyon from Phoenix on Saturday. It was beautiful in Phoenix but the weather just seemed to get worse and worse the further north I traveled. The clouds thickened and it finally started to rain around the Verde Valley. There was some hail mixed in with the rain for a while after that and then some light snow around Sedona. The closer I got to Flagstaff the heavier the snow became and in Flagstaff there were white-out conditions. There was not a lot of snow on the ground but it was blowing around like crazy.

I had originally planned to do some shopping and stop off at our place in Flagstaff for a couple of hours before heading up to the Canyon for dinner but I totally miscalculated the time available and had time for none of this. Because the snow was so bad I decided to not take US-180 up through the mountains to the Canyon and instead took I-40 west to Williams and then picked up AZ-64 there to the Canyon. Dinner was planned for 5 at We Cook Pizza and Pasta in Tusayan and I made it there by about 5 minutes after... fashionably late.

I had a nice dinner there with some guys from the Grand Canyon Hikers and Backpackers Association and afterwards Mike and I drove up to Mather Point to look at the Canyon. There was not much to look at with the howling wind and snow blowing everywhere so we didn't stay long. I went back to Flagstaff via AZ-64 and I-40 again and arrived at the house around 9pm or so.

It was beautiful up here today and the storm was gone. There was nice bright sunshine with deep blue skies and just a scattering of white puffy clouds. Late this morning I drove up on US-180, into the San Francisco Peaks, and took some photos of the mountains and the meadows with the newly fallen snow. After that I headed into town and picked up the rest of the food I need for the backpacking trip.

I had dinner with some other Canyon friends tonight: Hank, Mary and Robert; and while I was over at their place I got a call from Dave. He was going into Nankoweap a few days before me, was going to have a satellite phone with him, and promised to give me a call to let me know what the snow conditions were like in the Saddle Mountain area. I was very happy to hear that there was no snow. It was very odd to be receiving a phone call from someone camped in the Canyon... from Tilted Mesa.