Well, we rose to find we had no water. The pipes were frozen, both outside and inside the motor home. I had to put a small space heater in the basement to thaw our plumbing so we had water in about 30 minutes, but the outside temperatures were in the low single-digits, and it snowed about six inches during the night. I spent the better part of the morning brushing snow off of the slideouts so I could retract them, then brushing snow off of the truck so we could see to drive. It was 13 degrees when we decided to visit the Geology Museum at Yavapai Point. This is the parking lot at the museum. That is a sand truck behind us.
On the way back from the museum (which was outstanding in recreating the events that made the Grand Canyon), we came across this group of elk wandering about. We stayed with them for several minutes. They were busy eating berries off of the Juniper trees.
When we got back to camp and found out the weather was predicted to worsen, we made the decision to head out to Page. We quickly found out the highway to Page, through Desert View, was closed. With no turn around space. We took the “Keep Out” lane and turned into the South Kaibab Trailhead. We were stopped by a ranger who told us we were not supposed to be on this road, and I politely told him he could turn our 65 feet around at the barricade where they closed the highway without warning. Hmmm, he agreed that we could not have done that so we continued on and found space in the shuttle bus turn-around area. Upon exiting this road, we found traffic was stopped waiting for us to exit as the buses could not enter with us in there. Off to Page via Flagstaff, about a 100 mile detour.
There was a silver lining. We got an appointment in Flagstaff to repair our windshield while we were there and an appointment in Page to check our “check engine” light in the truck the next morning.
We got our windshield repaired as scheduled (Cathy negotiated the price down) and we found out that we had a catalytic failure in the truck. The local Ford dealer is replacing it under warranty. Good news all around. But weather in Page is predicting snow here tomorrow evening, the day before the ultra race. I am glad I brought my cold weather gear.
Travelling with the Schinglers 