Jordan and Brad put together a week long camping trip to Havasupi Falls. There were twelve people in our group: Jordan and I, Brad and his girlfriend Lindsey, two of Lindsey's coworkers Lisa and Lisa and childhood friends of Brads, Josh, Thommy, Pete, Rhett, his room mate Eric and Eric's girlfriend Shannon.
The first night we drove to the rim and slept in the parking lot in our sleeping bags. It was really windy and hard to sleep so Josh, Thommy, Pete and Rhett decided to hike during the night. The rest of our group woke up at 3:45am to be ready to hike by 4:00am. It was a ten mile hike downhill to the campsites. I knew it would be a challenge but I had no idea how hard hiking ten miles would be with a twenty pound pack on. It was brutal. We were all exhausted and sore by the time we reached the Supai village. We only had a moment of rest before hiking in the remaining two miles to our campsite. At the top of the last hill this is what we saw...
Havasu Falls!!
It was so incredibly beautiful. The water was crystal clear and the deeper it got the more teal blue it became. We found an amazing campsite by the river which was shaded most of the day. We set up camp, rested and then hiked back to the falls to swim.
Jordan and Brook
Eric, Pete, Rhett and Josh
Brad and Lindsey
Mooney Falls
Mooney Falls was about a 1/4 of a mile past our camp site. 'It is a towering and breathtaking waterfall of about 200 ft. in height. There is a really nice view of the falls from the top, looking down on the enticing pool into which the waterfall drops. The fun part (and scary part) of this waterfall, though, is getting to its base. From the top of the falls, the trail continues down to a warning sign, indicating to proceed at your own risk, and not to try descending in inclement weather.
Brad and Lindsey
Lisa
Brook
From here, you have to squeeze through two narrow tunnels built into the cliff. When you emerge from the tunnels, you are looking straight down the cliff to the pool at the base of the falls, and wondering if you are crazy enough to proceed.
Brad and Lindsey
It is a steep descent. But it is really not too difficult, unless you are scared of heights. There are sturdy chains to hang onto as you work your way down, and many footholds.
Once at the bottom, there is a lot of exploring to do. There is a great pool at the base of the falls for swimming. If you continue down the trail a bit, you will also come across what we are calling Lower Mooney Falls, a small but interesting 20 ft. waterfall. There are great views of the canyon there as well. The trail continues down to Beaver Falls and the Colorado River (another 6 miles downstream, after a lot of creek crossing and wading). '
Thommy
Brad and Lindsey
Brook and Lindsey
Jordan and Brook
Brad and Lindsey
Back at camp during the evenings we would play on the slack line that Brad had brought, read in the hammock, play skipbo and listen to music. For food we cooked all our meals on propane stoves and ate a lot of oatmeal, Ramon noodles, and granola bars. Its amazing how good all food tastes when you are camping.
One of the most fun days we had was the day that we hiked to rock falls. A new waterfall that was created after the flood of 2008.
Rock Falls
The hike down to the falls. (It looks a more traitorous than it actually was)
At the top of the falls, lying in the sun after a long day of cliff jumping, diving and swimming.
Pete behind the falls getting ready to jump.
After spending a really fun week in Havasupi little did we know that the adventure would continue. The hike out was all uphill and I was really nervous about it. I am naturally a really really slow hiker and hate holding people up. Jordan understands this and let me go ahead and hike about a half hour ahead of the rest of the group. They caught up rather quickly and by the time we reached the village I was already tired and sore. Jordan told me that Rhett and Thommy had decided to pay the money to helicopter them out and that he was going to send me with them. We ended up taking most of the bags for those who were hiking out to help them with weight.
Jordan, Brad, Lindsey, Eric and Shannon headed out and within minutes of hiking Jordan witnessed a guy being bucked off and drug by one of the horses that people can ride out of the canyon on. Brad and Eric both have some emergency training so they stabilized the guy until the doctor could come. He was in really bad shape. He had hit his head when he fell and was unconscious for a while. They ended up lifeflighting him to Flagstaff. It was scary and set them back two hours before they could start hiking.
It ended up working out pretty well time wise. The helicopters are given to locals first and hikers last so we waited about two hours before they even started flying hikers out. It was my first time in a helicopter. I cant say it was my favorite thing but it was so much better then ten miles of hiking up hill. I ended up getting to the top about forty minutes after the rest of the group.
We drove back to Phoenix and headed straight to Texas roadhouse for dinner. It was sooooo good. We all knew exactly what we wanted to order before they seated us. I am sure we looked and smelled wonderful but we didn't care. It was one of the best meals I have ever had.
We loved our trip and are already planning another trip for next year. It was the perfect group of people, the weather was amazing and we all had the best time. I cant wait to go back!
