Andy commented to me last night that the lower half seemed the right trip to go on, the right distance to go.

He wouldn't like the 7.5 mile hike out of the Canyon, which happens at the end of the Upper Canyon trip. The same hike where 45 minutes out of Indian Gardens rest stop, which is 4.5 of 7.5 miles into the hike DOWN, we met the Upper Canyon group coming up. A boy of maybe 16 in the group asked us how far to go to the next resting spot, so I answered that we had travelled the 45 minutes down, and they had about 75 minutes to the next resting spot. He looked at me in complete disbelief, to which I though, "Oh, kid, you have a long way to go to get out."

So, the Upper Canyon trip was out.

Doing the full canyon trip would take two weeks to complete. At that point, Andy commented, going home would be hard. Going back to the same job, the same life? Very very hard, as he would want to just stay in nature instead.

So, yeah, the Lower Canyon trip?

Best choice.

I'm more than a little entertained about the way that the canyon forms not only on a big scale, but also on the small scale.

As the waters receded from the dune we camped on, it created small sculptures and carvings that looked like the big stuff.

And the big stuff:

Andy: "Wow. That doesn't look appealing."

Me: "What does it look like?"

Andy: "A wet bed sheet."

At dinner yesterday evening, Tracy offered the suggestion of wetting our bed sheets in the river before going to bed. Both Kris and Andy did so. I opted to stay dry. I'm not sure either of them slept better last night for the wetness, as it also rained last night. A lot.

Kris, Andy and I had put up the tent before we went to bed. It had sprinkled a small bit last night, so we knew that rain was a possibility. It hadn't, however, rained enough to send us into the tent. Last night, we put up the tent just in case. We had also decided, based on the amount of wind in the Canyon at night, and how much sand said wind kicks up, that we were going to choose sleeping locations based on wind protection. We looked for areas where we were downwind of a large rock, outcropping or bush, and used our tent for wind protection in the other direction.

Last night, however, it rained. Not just the spattering of the night before, but full gusto, big drop, Arizona monsoon rain. I had jumped into the tent still dry, but Kris and Andy waited until the rain was really coming down. I then insisted they put the rain tarp on the tent, which we had neglected to do last night, so they were even wetter when they finally came in.

Before the rain began, the sky had cleared and I managed to see the black sky with so many more stars than I normally see. I managed to see the new constellations I learned on the plane flight over, though I didn't recall their names, as well as draco and a few others I did recognize.

We were camping at the 118 dune camp, which is in Steven's Aisle, after rafting though some big rapid yesterday.

Michael brought a disc along. Turns out, the upper canyon group played ultimate in some large cavern up river. I wish we could have been there. Michael has good stationary throws, which bodes well, as he's tall.

I think it won't be long until people figure out what Andy and Kris and I are champs in.

Okay, so, the first camera battery died today. One of my spares is broken, but I'll keep it out at night to let it dry in this dry, dry, "but it's a dry heat!" air, in hopes it'll be functional again. I won't try it until the end of the trip, though, in case it does something weird and ruins the camera.

I managed to get over 500 pictures on the first battery, I think close to 600, which includes turning the camera on and off, on and off over 200 times. I'm going to turn off the picture review, turn down the LCD brightness (which today I discovered was on full-bright), and try to minimize the on/off use as well as I can. I'm thinking of turning of the continuous autofocus, too. Not sure on that one.

Still, 600 pictures in 2 days. I'm both pleased and hopeful that 5 cards and 4.5 batteries will be sufficient.