April 23, 2021
ZERO DAY!
I slept in a little, but not much. We had breakfast at Plaza Bonita. The 7 Mile Hotel doesn’t have laundry amenities, but we were able to do a load at the Red Feather hotel next door. Putting on freshly laundered clothes always feels so glorious.
After that, we hung out in the room for a while watching the Andy Griffith Show and I almost took a nap, but then Bass came by to see if we wanted to go to lunch before he headed to Mather Campground. Ghosthiker decided to pass on lunch, opting instead to go for a short walk on a nearby trail, so I went with Bass. I needed to get out of the hotel room or I’d sleep the afternoon away.
After lunch, we met up with Cameron and Batman at Starbucks, where news reached us of a hiker named Erin who we’d met on trail a while back. She apparently had a bad fall and injured herself pretty severely, and we were communicating with her hiking partner while he tried to determine the best course of action to help her. He’d bandaged her leg as well as he could and was half-carrying her to the nearest road crossing. In the end, paramedics arrived on the scene and Erin was taken to the nearest hospital. We all felt terrible that her hike ended so close to the end but at least she was safe and had someone with her when the accident happened. It’s been so cold and rainy yesterday and today, being stuck out on trail in this weather with an injury like that would have been really bad.
After the drama from that died down, Batman invited both Bass and Cameron to share his hotel room at the 7 Mile Hotel so they wouldn’t have to camp at Mather Campground in this weather, and they happily accepted. We walked back to the hotel, where Ghosthiker was chatting with another hiker couple, and the group of us spent an hour or two sitting around on the balcony, chatting and doing random yoga stretches. We were all feeling very tight and sore, not just from hiking but because of the cold, damp weather.
After that, we went as a group to the Big E Steakhouse, and Ghosthiker and I both got the salmon entrée and cheesecake!
Then I took a bath with Epsom salts and went straight to bed. We’re leaving the hotel super early tomorrow morning to get to the Grand Canyon permit office as soon as it opens. We need to get our permit and get hiking ASAP because we’ve got a 21-mile day ahead of us going down into the Canyon.
Sarah Hikes 