I'll have some pictures uploaded to my facebook sometime soon... but what I just want to say is.... HOLY COW THE UPHILL CLIMB WAS KILLER! that is all... ;) I barely made it back alive, haha ok ok... well we only did approx 2 miles down Bright Angel trail, about 1.2 mile past the first stop at the 1.5 mile mark... that was the way easy part... I could've gone to the bottom no problem... but then we started back up... Lifting over 300lbs up(with my 8 bottles of water, etc) about 1200 vertical feet took me over 4 hours(everyone else did it in about 3)!! It took about 1.75 to 2 hours to get down there with a few short breaks. Signs say it takes an "average" person about 2x the descent time for the uphill. I guess I'm not "average", as you can easily tell, haha... I had to stop quite often to keep my heartrate down(if its too fast I feel faint). Near the end, about 45 mins from the top, my upper thighs started swelling and throbbing! Luckily I had my tendonitis pills(got mild tendonitis of my left ankle from a sprain a while back), which was a stronger ibprofin type medicine to help ease pain and swelling. Glad my ankles and feet were fine throughout the weekend, which is probably due to the comfortable shoes versus the old ones I had for my first Vegas trip, which caused major swelling. So after about 5 minutes of rest and slight stretching, I was able to slowly start moving back up. There were times my legs cramped up so badly that if I had leaned or was pushed the wrong way, I would've fallen off the trail because I wouldn't have been able to rebalance myself!! I can easily see how someone can seriously injure or harm themselves if unprepared or push themselves past their limits. If(nay, WHEN) I go again, I'll bring along a comfortable folding chair, haha! I really want to go to the bottom/river someday... I know at my current state I would have an extremely hard time(if not impossible) going down and back up in a single day(its not recommended at all for ANYBODY...) but I know it can be done... Although I'd rather camp down at the bottom(or stay at the lodge, hehe) and head upwards another day. Who wants to go with? how about at my slow pace? ;) I feel bad to have the others wait for me. I told them to go ahead and I'll meet back at campsite. They instead went and waited and ate ice cream!=P =P the lodge at the trail head had an ice cream shop. When I made it I thought about getting some ice cream also, as a reward, but my love for soda overwhelmed my liking for ice cream, so I got the large soda ;). The rest of the time we returned to camp, ate a good salmon dinner, and had s'mores and rested in front of the fire pit. Sunday we took a last stop at a rim and headed back. Timeline-- Friday night: arrive and set up tent at 1am Saturday, sleep... Saturday: breakfast, hike, dinner, s'mores, shower and sleep... Sunday: breakfast, pack and return home. Overall trip: lots of fun and torture and pain... but the fun outweighs the rest :) So when do YOU want to go camping with me? ;) | 
