The 6-hour drive up to the canyon wound through some amazing back country. The Salt River Canyon (almost like a mini-Grand Canyon), Snowflake, AZ (known for the UFO abduction made famous by DB Sweeney in "Fire in the Sky"), Holbrook, AZ on Route 66 (where the Wigwam Motel was the inspiration for the Cozy Cone Motel in "Cars"), just to a name a few.
We discussed how we would like to photograph the canyon, wondered if morning or afternoon sun would be better, and hoped for some monsoon storms to provide a dramatic backdrop to our photography. We finally arrived at the canyon mid-afternoon and did a quick drive-through on the south rim road to get a feeling of how the canyon is set up and to make a plan for the following day.
The 4th of July dawned with clear blue skies and temps in the mid 70's. You cannot go into the canyon without a Navajo guide, so we headed out on the north rim road and stopped at the various overlooks. It was a most beautiful day for photography as you can see in the video below. We really needed a good set of binoculars to look for the well-hidden cliff houses, but after a while we got the hang of it and were able to spot many of them quickly through the camera lens. The Massacre Cave Overlook is a sad reminder of the murder of 115 Navajo, mostly women and children, cornered and murdered in the cave by the Spanish military in 1805. The Mummy Cave Overlook has a view of the largest ancient village. Situated 300 feet above the canyon floor, this village has close to 70 rooms.
The afternoon took us to the south rim drive and many more overlooks. At one of the overlooks, we met a Native American flutist named D'Von Charley and had a chance to chat with him for a while. His music is amazing and provides the background for the second half of the video. He told us he records his music in the canyon and all of the natural sounds you hear are from the canyon and not artificially produced. If you'd like to hear more of his music, it is available on YouTube.
A few more overlooks to explore, including Spider Rock and the White House Ruins, where you can hike the only trail into the canyon without a guide. It was 5:00 p.m. and storm clouds were building all afternoon. Mother Nature had answered our monsoon prayers and we got some amazing shots. We discussed whether or not we should hike into the canyon and a check of the weather radar on our phones showed the storms were about 40 miles to the east and 25 miles to the west, heading away from us with nothing building in our area or headed in our direction. We assessed the trail and saw it was 2 1/2 mile round trip, with about half of it teetering and winding along the cliff face. My immense fear of heights went to battle with my desire to see the ruins up close, and the ruins eventually won. Off we go, one step at a time, trying not to look over the edge. We finally reached the ruins about 6:15.
The White House ruins were stunning. How did they climb up there? How did they build it up there? How many lived in it? So many questions! Shooting shot after shot trying to get the perfect exposure, when it happened. A single drop of rain on my lens. A stray, to be sure! Then his relatives started showing up and their relatives, soon followed by a deluge complete with thunder and lightning. We took cover in the restrooms, hoping it was a passing storm. 15 minutes later there was no sign of it letting up. A peek outside confirmed the sinking feeling....it was going to hang out for a while. This was not what I had in mind when I hoped for a monsoon storm! Since it would be dark in 2 hours and it took an hour and a half to hike down, we made the decision that we had to get out of there. First, the last place you want to be in a monsoon storm is at the bottom of a canyon and second, we didn't want to be trapped there after dark.
We stuffed our cameras under our shirts, said several prayers, took a deep breath and stepped out into the torrential rain. We saw a tour vehicle coming down the wash and tried to flag him down to see if he would give us a ride. They just smiled, wove back and kept on going. Nice. Our hopes dashed, we turned back to the trail. The first half mile or so was in the dirt up an incline. It was already saturated from the rain, making our footing very muddy and slippery and tremendously slowing our progress. We finally made it to the small tunnel at the bottom of the cliff face only to see a roaring river running beside it where it was bone dry just an hour before. Thinking this was not a good sign, we exited the cave anyway to have a look around. We looked up at the 700 ft. elevation gain trail to see many waterfalls streaming off the top of the cliff, landing on the trail. Where there were no waterfalls, the trail had turned into a river. The prospect of getting out alive seemed to be getting slimmer. I was sure one of those waterfalls was going to sweep us right off the trail and into the canyon below, or maybe if we were meant to die here, it would be by one of the lightning strikes and get it over quickly. We pushed on, step by step, never looking down, holding our breaths as we inched our way beneath the waterfalls. By the grace of God and some wonderful angels watching out for us (and my #1 angel, Pete), we made it to the top and to our car. A quick hug for Big Red and we jumped in and sat there for 10 minutes catching our breath. We drove back to the hotel and watched that storm sit over the canyon all night and into the next morning. We clearly made the right decision to get out.
We are extremely grateful and thankful to be here today writing this story and sharing our work. I'd like to leave you with one last thought.....
Be careful what you wish for and
NEVER.EVER.UNDERESTIMATE MOTHER NATURE!!!
Here is the link to our video: Canyon de Chelly
(Click on the link and select Goto Link)
Here is the link to our video: Canyon de Chelly
(Click on the link and select Goto Link)
Until our next adventure, Peace!
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