Newark, Phoenix, and the Grand Canyon,, Monday, March 23, 2026
Making our plane was not without its bumps. I thought that we had left plenty of time, but there were huge delays on the New Jersey Turnpike. We arrived in Newark a full 45 minutes after I thought we would.
As we neared the airport, Sue read that there was a ground stoppage caused by smoke in the control tower. By the time we reached our parking lot, the stoppage had been cleared. In the end, flights were delayed by only half an hour, which wasn’t bad. We did see a number of ICE agents, but they were standing around and clearly had no idea why they were there.
The flight felt a bit long and the Boeing 737 like a very narrow tin can, but before we knew it, we were in Phoenix and climbing into our humongous ride for this trip, a Jeep Grand Wagoneer that seats eight!
It took a while to drive through the exurban hellhole that is Phoenix. There are now five million thirsty souls in a landscape meant to support lizards and snakes, and they have spread out miles in every direction. I’ve always found the area around Phoenix unusually bleak: barren desert, barren volcanic peaks.
As we rose, we began to pass through the northernmost Sonoran desert. Not as verdant as the desert around Tucson, but an improvement over the Phoenix basin. Interstate 17 begins to rise rapidly an hour north of Phoenix; the roadway twists and turns through mountain passes, with chaparral replacing desert vegetation.
We were all awed by the enormously long vistas, with mountain ranges rolling into the distance and an endless series of unusual landforms. At the little town of Camp Verde, we began, as the name implies, to encounter a greener landscape.
As the interstate nears the town of Flagstaff it rises to over 7000 feet and passes through gorgeous ponderosa pine forests. For those of you of a certain age, think Bonanza.
Views then open onto the San Francisco Peaks, with summits close to 13,000 feet. There was still some snow on the southern slopes, but as we passed to the north, the northern slopes were still totally snow covered.
Somebody remind me why I live in New Jersey!
Our road led us onto Interstate 10 west for a while, then on fast state roads due north to the canyon. Our first sign that Trump had laid his dirty paws on the parks was at the entrance gate. There had been so many staff firings that there was no one present to collect fees!
We were staying at the Bright Angel Lodge, one of the oldest accommodations at the canyon. As we learned later, much of the infrastructure at the canyon’s rim had been designed by the architect Mary Colter, whose work blended Spanish Colonial Revival and Mission Revival architectural elements with Native American motifs.
Parking proved to be a bit of a problem. There are far fewer spaces than rooms in thee properties along the rim, and I was forced to drive around the loop road and park a fifteen minute walk from our cabin.
The cabins are simple but quite comfortable, with a good bed and a great shower; who needs more?
Dinner at the Arizona Steakhouse was pretty good, with one exception: the steak. Salads were good to very good, and Sue’s fish was nice. My steak was the cheapest cut imaginable at an unimaginable price. Serves me right.
We had sat down to dinner at 8 PM, or 11 PM EST, depending on how you look at it. My body definitely looked at it as 11, especially after a longish drive. I fell into bed and it was lights out.