Hiking Down & Up at the Grand Canyon
 

Would love to hear from anyone who has done this hike....tips/advice...especially from those
who are not considered "experienced trekkers". A family trip is planned for end of July,2011.
Ages are 18-68...everyone is trim & athletic....but what about stamina? How was the trail?
Any info will be appreciated. Thanks.

Are you doing this in one day?
I would make sure to have good fitting,worn-in hiking boots.
I hiked down in the winter,it snowed.It could be very hot in July.

I don't think the heat is an issue as you are in elevation. You will probably feel that.

There's nothing to stop you from resting along the way.

Make sure you drink lots of water, wear a hat and good hiking footwear and use suntan lotion.

Heat is definitely an issue in July. The TOP of the GC is at elevation, the river is 5000' lower and can be 20 or more degrees hotter than at the rim. This is NOT a trek you can do in one day, especially in the summer. If you want to make it a 2 day trip you need to have reservations at Phantom Ranch by the river, and you need to get those 1yr in advance as they sell out.

Our son just hiked down 1.5 hours a few days ago on the Bright Angel trail. Great photos and probably doable for anyone that does not have vertigo and can climb a couple floors of steps in a building without getting exhausted. Remember to pace yourself and it normally takes much longer to go back up than to go down.

He said it was worth it but got no where near the bottom. To get a good feel for the canyon at the bottom don't miss the film outside the park at the IMAX theater.

Hiking down to the bottom and back up isn't something you should try for a "first hike". Even if you are doing this in two days, you will want to start hiking before the sun rises. Now if everyone is super conditioned, it might(i stress might) be ok. In other words, if you run 10 miles every day, probably would be all right. You can camp at the bottom, if you don't have reservations at Phantom Ranch. However, then everyone is going to be carrying 25-40lbs on their backs. Again, not something to attempt if you haven't backpacked before. The park rescues many people every year who get in serious trouble attempting to hike more than they are capable of. Heat exhaustion is a REAL issue. If you are not conditioned to heat(especially at the time you mention hiking it)don't attempt it. Just this past week I saw four park rangers carry an older gentleman down a trail. This was on a 2 mile hike, only 85 degrees, and still snow on the ground. Know what you can do before attempting it. A hike to the bottom and back is one of the more serious hikes anywhere. That said, many many people do it and love it. I would suggest for a first attempt, to try it in October or May.

This was on the NPS site:

Q: How long will it take to get to the bottom from the South Rim?

A: The South Kaibab Trail is 6.8 miles to Bright Angel Campground and the Bright Angel Trail is 9.3 miles. It will take most hikers between 4 and 5 hours to get to the campground on either trail. Oddly enough, very few people ask how long the return hike will take. The return hike may take twice as long, though 7 to 8 hours seems to be average. Underestimating the elevation change and not eating or drinking enough can easily add a few hours to those averages.


Q: Can I go to the bottom and back in one day?

A: The National Park Service DOES NOT RECOMMEND hiking from the rim to the river and back in one day.


You can read more here:
http://www.nps.gov/grca/planyourvisit/hiking-faq.htm

We have reservations at Phantom Ranch for the night.....have to go in late July because of
school/schedules etc....thanks for the advice so far!

This is a very serious undertaking in the summer. The temperatures at the bottom can exceed 110. It gets hotter as you go down, not cooler. (The South Rim is at 7900 ft elevation)

Being fit is just one part of it. Being well-prepared to deal with the distance, the altitude change/gain, the heat. There are fatalities every year, sadly.

Nottingham,

Just curious. Where are you from and do you happen to work out in the heat or do any kind of serious activity in the heat?

You can also find all the water sources along the way on the NPS site. This might make a difference in which route you take. I would leave Phantom Ranch as soon as you eat breakfast. I think it is at like 5:00am or something like that.

Having reservations at Phantom makes it less difficult but it's still not easy because you'll have to hike out in the heat.

I would set out down Kaibab no later than mid-morning, should take anywhere from 2 - 4 hours to hike down, hiking down is easy. Earlier is better for scenery and less heat but if you get there too early you'll have to wait hours for your dorm or cabin.

The tricky part is hiking back out, which you should do up Bright Angel since it has water and a Ranger Station, plus some shade (Kaibab is steeper and waterless). It's a couple of level miles beside the river, then about 7 miles of 'up' to the rim. A fast hiker can come out in 1.5x to 2x the time it took to hike down, a slow hiker typically takes 3-4x as long to hike out. Probably 4-8 hours is typical in the summer for the Phantom-to-rim hike up BA trail.

I've hiked almost 1,200 miles in the canyon and I'd suggest taking the lightest possible pack down. We used to hike rim-to-rim with just a small waist pack that would hold 2 quarts of water, a change of socks and underwear and a few Power Bars. Having a lot of weight on your back (or unnecessary weight anywhere) will wear you out.

I would also take something like moleskin for blisters so you can treat your feet that night at Phantom. Most likely you'll blister up with all the downhill walking and it will be less painful hiking out if you have the moleskin to cover them.

Expect high heat on the walk out, probably 105 F to 110 F at Phantom in the afternoon, sometimes hotter. So you want to get a very early start out. I used to like to start at 4 AM when doing rim-to-rim in the summer, for example. This may mean missing breakfast at the Ranch, but if some of your party struggled day one they will REALLY stuggle day 2 in the heat so start as early as you can to miss the worst of it.

Most people have sore legs and calves from hiking down, and get dehydrated from not drinking enough, so are in less-than-prime condition for the hike out.

Fill up your canteens before you leave and also drink heavily. Top off canteens again at Indian Gardens (4.7 miles from the rim), and both 3 mile and 1.5 mile rest houses.

Every year there are 250 - 350 hiker 'rescues' in the GC, most in the summer when people either run low on water or can't take the heat and get heat exhaustion and then heat stroke. Most years there are 1-3 hiker deaths in the summer. I remember one really hot dry year when seven hikers died and another 18 were brought out in critical condition. So don't underestimate the dangers ... being in shape and getting an early start before the heat is over powering is the key.

You wrote <b>"everyone is trim & athletic"</b> ... I'll bet that if Rangers rescued 300 people last year then 250 of them were also 'trim and athletic' ... the heat and exertion does funny things to people even when they are fit. Be careful, keep hydrated, get an early start and you should be OK.

I've said it before, I'll say it now, and I'm sure I'll say it again: desert canyon hiking, particularly in summer, is different from any other type of hiking. Just because you can do one type of athletic activity does not, in ANY way, mean you can do this. I say this as someone who HAS hiked to the bottom and back out in two days, as well as up Mount Whitney, and over 200 miles on the Appalachian Trail. All of these are do-able *IF* you are willing to properly prepare and plan for each one.

One of the often-overlooked keys to hiking The Canyon is that your knees will be going down and up THOUSANDS of times. You *MUST* get these in shape, months ahead of time, by walking up and down steps for a MINIMUM of one hour without any discomfort. If you can't do that, forget about The Canyon.

When you finally get there, cover your skin with light cotton and sunscreen, as well as a hat. Carry AND DRINK lots of water. Start early, do NOT hike up while the Sun is out, and learn to walk slowly.

If you approach hiking in The Canyon with the respect it deserves, your hike will be one of the most enjoyable hikes of your life. If you don't, it will be one of the most miserable. The choice is yours -- it really is that simple.

I hiked the Hermit Trail in august 1990 and I still remember the heat. It was almost unbearable. We camped at the bottom and walked back up the next day. I still remember being more sore after that than I have ever been. I have since ran several marathons etc.

heat will be a factor. years ago i spent the night on the rim over Havasu Canyon and FROZE (in April or March), yet it was warm enough at the bottom to go swimming.

Some people can go down and up in the same day. A college friend did it - but he was a world class track and field athlete!

spirobulldog.....
We all live in the hot-humid south.

Are you from a climate that gets a lot of very high temps? If not, then you really have no idea how bad the heat can be. (Remember the British marathner who was expected to place at the Greece Olympics and had to drop out because of the heat?)

Also, the significant difference in altitude can affect a lot of people - especially if they any sort of lung problems - asthma, allergies - or have ever smoked.

A couple of friends of one of my step-daughters (college athletes in great shape) decided to try this for fun on the spur of the moment - and got about an hour down the trail - and ended up back at the top 5 hours later totally exhausted and dehydrated. What they did was foolish - but in the summer this does have a lot of dangers for anyone not used to very high temps.

Living in the hot and humid south, and spending 7-8hrs of very vigorous exercise in the full heat are two very different things.

I've found that hiking vertically, up or down, uses totally different muscles & puts different strain on my joints than I'm used to. For a hike like this several training hikes in the weeks leading up to your trip are really a great idea. Find a mountain with a 5000' elevation gain and hike from bottom to top is perfect. Of if the highest mountain is 1250' gain go up and down four times.

Oh heck, GO FOR IT!! I think the key is drinking plenty and starting out early. I think everyone just wanted to warn you the best they could. Just read everyones advice, but especially Bill H. He has given me great advice on a few of my trips. I live in the humid south also, but I work outdoors all day, so I am used to it. Today was fairly brutal, 100 with heat index of 110. I operate trash trucks with no A/C. Now I don't know if that is any comparison to walking up a hill 5000ft. lol. Have a great trip. I haven't stayed at Phantom(yet). I look forward to hearing your trip report on your return. Have a fantastic trip!! I have a friend that did this last year, but he did it rim to rim in August and he made it just fine.

Have you considered the mule trip?

http://www.nps.gov/grca/planyourvisit/mule_trips.htm

The mules get the right of way on all trails, so you have to go to the rim side of the trail when they pass. Yikes.

Appreciate ALL the Advice +Tips....it is a great help ...this is something one should not do on a whim...needs to be researched IMO.......Now tell me this..HOW WIDE are the trails...& HOW CLOSE do you get to the EDGE????????.....Help me with that question!

Another piece of advice is that everyone should be wearing proper footwear that is well-broken in. They don't have to be huge heavy boots, but something with a hard sole, and with ankle support is key. I prefer a leather or dense fabric, not a mesh which will let grit or sand into your shoe. Also, having dry socks is also key. Your feet will sweat and swell and socks serve to reduce the friction between the inner boot and your skin. The boots should be well worn-in, so that there are no new-boot surprises which usually end up as bad blisters. Also, bring along lots of moleskin and a small pair of scissors to cut them into the right size patches. Doesn't completely eliminate blisters, but does a great job of protecting blister-prone areas.

You will probably be on a narrow section of the trail about the time you meet the mules. The mules have the right-of-way.

You can get a look at tons of hikes down the GC on youtube. This will give you a pretty good idea of what to expect.

We trudged through two feet of fresh powder snow when we came out of the canyon. The true edge of the trail was sometimes difficult to determine.
The mules do have the right of way and you must stand on the canyon side of the rail when they pass.
I don't recall any really scary drop-offs on the Bright Angel trail.

<b>Now tell me this..HOW WIDE are the trails...& HOW CLOSE do you get to the EDGE??</b>

Trails are wider than a sidewalk, there are a few places on Kaibab trail where if you stumble off the trail a couple paces you could fall quite a ways but people tend to pay more attention in these spots. Probably 95% of the people who die in falls do so from the rim where they are showing off and lose their balance (or kids who aren't watched properly by parents) and most of the rest occur on the non-maintained wilderness trails, which you aren't going on.

As for the mules, usually you can see them coming several minutes away and find a wider spot in the trail where you can stand quietly off to the side and let them pass. In dozens of hikes on Kaibab and Bright Angel I can't remember a single time where I had to teeter on the outside edge of the trail over an abyss while the mules passed.

The two main nuisances from the mules, in my experience, are 1) the wranglers stop them occaionally and the mules urinate at the same spot, creating ponds of foul-smelling mule piss you have to walk thru or around (I've teetered on the edge of the abyss a couple of times walking around the mule piss) ;) And 2) if you are a fast hiker you can get stuck behind the mules on the walk out as the wranglers often halt to tell some cornball story while giving the mules a rest. Now that they are cutting back on the number of daily mule rides due to problems with trail damages this may not be a big deal (or if you are a slow hiker it's not a big deal either).

<b>I hiked the Hermit Trail in August 1990 and I still remember the heat. It was almost unbearable.</b>

Ah, 1990 … the summer that Phoenix temperatures reached 122 F for the first time and the airport shut down “due to extreme heat” because the charts for how long a runway was required for take-off only went as high as 120 F.

I’ll never forget it because I was in the GC that 122 F weekend doing a 38 mile death march on the Tonto Plateau and a 26 year old medical student in the group ahead of us died from heat stroke. Here’s the tale (warning, long) …

I was hiking with Mark, a co-worker who was an ex-Marine and had won a triathalon a year prior. He was about 15 years younger than me and in much better shape, but I had a lot more experience hiking wilderness trails and could hike all day, so it evened out.

We drove up Friday night after work and rough-camped in the national forest south of Tusayan, then were at the BRO (backcountry ranger office) at 7 AM to pick up our camping permit for Cremation Canyon. The plan was to hike down from Grandview Point to the Tonto Trail, then follow the Tonto about 25 miles to Indian Gardens and hike out on the Bright Angel trail. With a side-trip near Horseshoe Mesa below Grandview to an old copper mining site we figured 38 miles total, with relatively little elevation change since the Tonto followed a mostly a level plateau about 1,200 ft above the river.

First snag was at the BRO, where the Ranger didn’t show for 45 minutes. He said he had to arrange for a mule train to descend into the canyon to pick up the body of a young hiker who had died the night before. The hiker had attempted the same hike we were doing and had died at Cremation Canyon, less than a mile from where the Tonto intersects the Kaibab Trail, where there’s an emergency phone. His wife had struggled to get to the phone and call for help (he gave her the last of the water) but it was too late to save him.

“All of you should forget about hiking outside the Kaibab-Bright Angel corridor today” he said to the waiting group. “Too hot. You could die out there.” The Kaibab and Bright Angel trails are maintained and have a lot of foot and mule traffic, water at three places on the BA, and ranger stations at the river and at Indian Gardens. The non-maintained trails have little hiker traffic and a mishap there can quickly turn fatal, as with the young dead hiker.

There was a sign in the BRO stating “the hottest temperature ever on this date (last week in June) was 111 F” … I knew I could run 4 miles at lunchtime at my normal pace at 105 F (did it almost every day) so I figured I was OK walking at 111 F. Mark was much fitter than me.

We were second in line and he scared the first group out of their permit to Hermit Basin, getting them to change to Indian Gardens. Took a while because they had many questions. I was antsy because I knew we were wasting more precious time getting started.

When I told him our plans the Ranger was angry that we would consider it given the dead body, especially since he had OK’ed their camping permit. “How much water did they have?” I asked. “Three quarts for 2 people … he planned on filling up at Cottonwood Canyon but couldn’t find the spring, which is almost dried up in the drought”. “We are carrying six gallons, three gallons each.”

He said “Do you know how long this hike is?” and I gave him the mileage to a tenth of a mile … “Three weeks ago I hiked down Kaibab to Ribbon Falls with camera gear to photograph the mist rainbow when the sun first hits the falls. 28 miles, 6,000 ft down, 6,000 ft back up. No problem. Two weeks before that we hiked rim-to-rim, spent the night and hiked back the next morning. 44 miles, 11,600 ft down, 11,600 ft up, under 8 hours each way. No problem.” The hike we were doing only had about 3,800 ft of up and down and the distance wasn’t too bad with an over-night stop, though most groups took 2-3 nights. I wanted to streak it to see if there were scenic areas worth returning to in the spring with heavy camera gear.

He asked to see our gear … waist packs with four quarts of frozen canteens, soft (light) backpacks with two gallon jugs of water at the bottom under minimal camping gear (ground cloth, ¾ length pad, thin sheet, food for 3 meals).

“OK, I guess you’re in shape and have enough water but you are still idiots if you do this hike in this heat. If something goes wrong it will be tight getting you rescued in time.” I was thinking 111 F wasn’t that bad and just nodded as if to say “Yup, we’re idiots, just give us the damn permit so we can get going!”. Which he finally did after writing “NOT RECOMMENDED!!” on it.

So it was probably after 9 AM before we parked a shuttle car near El Tovar and drove to the trailhead at Grandview Point. On a summer day hike I like to start as early as I can see my feet, usually 4 AM mid-summer, so we were several hours behind schedule. I knew we would suffer in the afternoon heat.

We hiked down Grandview Trail to Horseshoe Mesa, an interesting area not quite half-way to the river with excellent camping, great views up and down river, and with remnants of an old copper mining camp from the pre-National Park days, then plunged down a steep trail to the Tonto. The mesa is about the elevation of Sedona with agave plants and small juniper trees the dominant vegetation, but the Tonto traverses a rocky desert, with cactus and a few well-spaced brittle knee-high shrubs dominating.

I didn’t wear a watch and don’t know the precise times, but by mid-day it was clear that while we could definitely walk thru the heat we didn’t have enough water to drink thru the heat. Mark was sweating badly and drinking constantly and when we stopped to pour water from his first plastic jug to his empty canteens we saw the jug had been compressed by his camping gear and about a quart had leaked out.

We decided to hole up at Grapevine canyon where a high walled ridge provided a bit of shade, avoiding the brunt of the mid-afternoon heat for about three hours. “Remember last August when we hiked rim-to-rim and saw the flyers at Phantom Ranch asking hikers to be on the lookout for the missing hiker? This is where they found his body.”

This guy was my age and a very experienced GC backcountry hiker, so I had followed his story carefully. He was doing the same route as us but over three nights instead of one. He became a bit weak and couldn’t keep up so his partner went on ahead with plans to set camp and meet later at their next permit site but he wasn’t seen again. A two week air and land search costing over $50,000 failed to turn up any sign of him.

Seven months later in March someone with a camping permit for Grapevine basin was prowling around the brush and rocks at the head of the drainage about 200 yards from where we were sitting and found the body. The report said he had simply sat down in the shade behind a rock and died sitting up, unable to rise and continue. There was food in his pack and water in his canteens but the heat overwhelmed him. And it was about 10 degrees cooler when he died than what we were facing.

We waited about four hours, then when the angle of the sun was getting low we started back on the Tonto, knowing we couldn’t make Cremation by dark. I don’t know how hot it was on the plateau but it was 117 F at Phantom Ranch (shattering the old 111 F record) in the shade beside a cool clear creek. We had no shade and no creek and it was probably hotter than 117.

Once it got dark we had to decide between hunkering down on a wide spot in the trail and waiting for dawn or keep plugging. As the experienced one I got to make the decision … “three things can go wrong if we hike in the dark with no moon … someone could step on a rattlesnake and get bit (plenty of rattlers on the Tonto and they would be out at night), someone could turn an ankle on the loose rocks, or we could waste a lot of time and energy by getting lost crossing the heads of the canyons (these were tough enough to cross in the light).” Getting snakebite or spraining an ankle would require a rescue, something I really wanted to avoid, so we rolled out the ground cloths and pads and tried to sleep. We had just 4 quarts of water between us by now, just two quarts when we started back on the trail the next morning at the first hint of light, with probably 10-12 miles to Indian Gardens and unlimited water.

We finished the last of the water about the time the sun cleared the rim, making good time before the heat flared again. Two water-less hours later we reached Cremation Canyon (I thought “what a miserable place for the guy to die”) and could see the slash of the switchbacks on the Kaibab. When Mark saw a group coming down (“Look, more idiots” he said) he took off at a near-sprint to flag them down where the trails intersected and managed to cadge a gallon of water from them, since they were just 45 minutes of downhill walking from the river and Phantom Ranch.

We drank most of this water while mulling our options, which were basically to go down Kaibab to the river or keep level on the Tonto for another hour or so to reach Indian Gardens. Avoiding the hike down would save us probably 2 hours of afternoon hiking plus an extra 1,200 ft elevation so we kept hiking on the Tonto. We ran out of water again but reached Indian Gardens and its unlimited water supply without further drama.

Several times we saw helicopters lifting prostate hikers out of the canyon on emergency rescues, mostly from Hermit Basin. I read somewhere Rangers did more chopper rescues that week than any other. How do you rate a chopper ride? They stick a thermometer up an orifice and if you read 105 F or more you are considered too far gone to hike out on your own.

I can usually hike the 4.7 miles out from Indian G to the rim in 1.5 – 2 hours. Once after a rafting trip, when my companion became a bit ill and I had to carry both her gear and mine in a huge soft duffle, I took a bit over 3 hours with a bag weighing 84 lbs (two sets of medium format camera gear and tripods plus camping gear, clothes, etc) when I weighed it later. Today, with all the heat and lack of water earlier, we took almost 4 hours to drag our sorry butts out even with very light packs. And we were still passing most other people on the trail because the heat was so enervating.

At the top we had lunch at the General Store and I drank three big glasses of lemonade but my legs started cramping so badly I couldn’t sit and had to stretch out on a bench. My truck had a 5 speed manual transmission and pushing in the clutch was agony with my cramping legs so I would rev it up in first gear, then shift directly to 3rd, then 5th to cut the number of shifts in half. The last thing Mark said before we split up for the drives back to Phoenix was “I’ll never go hiking with you again off-trail. This was hell.” “If it wasn’t so hot or if we had gotten an earlier start it would have been a lot easier” I said.

When I got home four hours later I took a shower and stepped on the scales. Two days earlier I had weighed 187 lbs before driving up, now I weighed 173. In the intervening two days I had drank at least 6 – 7 gallons of liquid and never once urinated. Water weighs about 8.3 lbs/gallon so I had consumed 50-60 lbs of liquid and still lost 14 lbs of body weight. When I mentioned this to my doctor a few months later he said “don’t make it a habit, you could seriously damage your kidneys.” I assured him this was a one time deal and I’ve since avoided overnight hiking in the canyon when temps are over 105 F and dayhikes when it’s over 115 F. I know I can do the hikes in extreme heat but it’s just not much fun.

The next day Phoenix’s high temp was 120 F, the following day a new all-time record of 122 F was set and people were dying across the state from heatstroke.

The third day after the hike Mark stopped by my office. “So when’s the next hike?” I figured he’d come around but not that quickly.

“I was thinking October when it’s cooler, maybe go back to Horseshoe Mesa and take the Tonto in the other direction to Hance Rapids, then hike up Hance trail. Hance is the toughest south rim trail but we can do this as a long day hike so we don’t have to screw around waiting for a permit at the BRO.”

“How far?” “Probably 25 miles, 5,000 ft climb up at the end with no water and a hard-to-follow trail with a lot of washouts … could be the mother of all dayhikes.”

“Count me in!”

Make sure you all have trekking poles. We also bought ballet toe guards at the dance store--helps protect toes for the hike down when your toes can push against the front of your boot. We still had one hiker lose a toenail. I've seen photos online of some really nasty blisters on feet from this hike. They must have been miserable hiking--take moleskin.

I think you said you had reservations in the lodge but if you have camping gear, you can have the mules carry it down and back up--which I would definitely do.

Our group hiked the last week of March in perfect weather so they didn't have to deal with the heat--they did carry all their camping gear though which was challenging.

The heat is an issue--even for fit hikers.

The hike is beautiful and a fabulous experience.

Thanks again for the great input...have passed all this info on to family members. ...and will continue to welcome all info/tips/stories....MuleUrine...People dying....heat exhaustion...blisters...doesn't sound like a good time to me!

<b>MuleUrine... People dying .... heat exhaustion ... blisters... doesn't sound like a good time to me!</b>

I've taken maybe 40 people from work on their first extreme canyon hike. About 5% hated it, 90% thought it was a great trip once they were safely back on the rim and the soreness subsided a bit but didn't sign up for repeats, 5% thought it was great and couldn't wait to go again and again.

If you could go in say April or October you'd miss all the heat related drama and it's a much more pleasant walk (still strenuous but not grueling), but summer hiking in the desert is very challenging. People are still doing it because of vacation schedules but you'll suffer.

I VOTE for April or October.....my husband & I are NOT going to do this in the heat...other family members are still going for it! I have passed all info on to them and told them to
READ it...also the GCNational Park info.....WE want our life to be a bit easier now...don't need HEAT problems, as we have suffered enough thru this miserable July with the record-breaking
temps.!!! Thanks again ALL of you for all the valuable input!

My son and I just got back from Hiking Rim to Rim in the canyon. We went from the south rim to the north in 3 days. We hiked down to Bright Angel Camp the first day, the thermomiter at Indian Gardens read 120 and at Bright Angel Camp / Phantom Ranch it read 140. The worst part of this leg of the trip was just out side to Indian Gardens going down the caldron. It's black rock with now air and just heat and the last 2 miles to thr bridge. It was thru beach sand which just radiates the heat. The next leg was to Cotton Wood. Not a bad hike except for all the thresholds that you have to step over. Day three was from Cotton Wood out the North Rim. Its only a 5K foot assent, same as it would be going from Bright Angel Camp / Phantom Ranch out. Again you have to deal with the stepping over the thresholds going out. Climming the switch backs isn't that bad until you get to Supai Tunnel and you are only 1.7 miles from the trail head. This is where the Mules come into play. They terrace the trail for the Mules and these steps can be anywhere from 12 inches to 16 inches high and the soul is loose from the mules and its just a bear. It was a great experiance. Drink and Eat alot as you are going down and up. Water will only hydrate you but flush salts and electrolites out of your system. Have fun

We just completed (in May 2017) a hike from the South Rim to the Colorado River and back to the rim in one day. My husband and I are 50 and 45 years old. All of our kids hiked with us (ages: 16, 15, 13, 12). It was a challenging hike and we put a lot of thought into whether to attempt such a arduous hike. Our kids are all in great shape............all of them run cross country and one of them rows crew. My husband and I walk/hike a lot, but I would consider us in "average" shape. We hiked the Bright Angel trail both directions (started at 7:30 am and ended at 5:50 pm). We did this because we thought we may just stop at Indian Gardens, perhaps hike Plateau Point, then hike back out. When we got to Indian Gardens, we decided to go for it. I will not lie, it is a tough hike coming back out. The weather was great that day............in the high 70s on the rim and probably in the 90s at the bottom of the canyon. It took us approximately 5 hours to hike to the river and 5 hours to hike back out. Most people will tell you that for every hour you hike in, you should expect it to take you two hours to cover that same distance on the way out. This freaked us out when we got to the bottom (since we thought by that rule, it would take us 9-10 hours to hike out). However, it took us the same amount of time to get out. It is doable................but choose a time when the weather is great, take lots of high calorie snacks, and take electrolyte mix that you can mix with water to keep yourself hydrated.