Thursday, September 27, 2012

Horseshoe Bend, Antelope Canyon- September 27,2012

What a busy and fun day we had today.  We started by going to Horseshoe Bend- as the name implies a bend of the Colorado River.  This was a mile and a half hike that climbed up and down a sandy hill.  That sand walking is a real drag but the view was worth the effort to get there.  We then drove toward Lee's Ferry stopping at the Navaho Bridge Interpretive Center.  The Navaho Bridge, a crossing of the Colorado River, opened in the 1920's and is, now, closed  except for foot traffic.  A newer bridge was built in the 1990's to handle the heavier traffic. Two California condors were perched on the trestles of the new bridge- wow, we were excited to see these big birds.
  We continued to Lee's Ferry, an area that was used by the Mormons when they moved into this territory.  Today, rafts floating down the Colorado land here and other rafts going on more adventuresome raft trips take off from here.  Fishermen also use this area to put their boats in the River.  We were surrounded by beautiful Vermilion Cliffs.
Returning to Page, we grabbed a lunch at a barbeque restaurant before going on the Upper Antelope Canyon tour.  Antelope Canyon is on Navaho Reservation and in order to see the canyon an Indian guide must be along.  We were scheduled to go on the 1:30pm tour.  There was a large group assembled to go on this tour but we were divided into groups of 14 or 15 and then we loaded into seats in the backs of pick-up trucks and took off on a 20 minute ride to the canyon (the last 10 minutes we were on a sandy road and felt like traveling through 8-10 inches of snow).  Our tour guide, Rosie, was a real gem as she assisted all of us in taking pictures of this beautiful canyon.    The canyon is a quarter  of  a mile in length.
After that tour we drove out to Antelope Point, the marina of Glen Canyon.  There is a long paved downhill walkway to the marina.  Golf carts also use the walkway and rides are available to the marina.  We chose to walk down but we did ride up - an easier way to get to the top .  The private marina had mostly huge houseboats and a few other power boats.  There were no sailboats.  As we drove from this area we saw another marina that had houseboats for rent.
Returning to Page, again, we stopped for dinner at a Mexican restaurant  before calling it a day and getting back to the motorhome for the night.