May 2, 2026. Yesterday was quite a day.
We woke up in the cliffside campsite, packed up in about 45 minutes each, and got out with no drama. Shannon navigated the tricky section without a problem. The 50 point turn I'd been dreading turned out to be simple.
At the junction where the dirt road meets the pavement we stopped to make coffee before splitting up. Someone pulled up alongside us and said there'd been a head-on collision a couple miles toward Hurricane and the road was closed for a couple hours. Shannon was headed the other direction so she went on her way. I cleared off my bed and tried to nap. When I woke up the traffic was still there but I waited out what was left and arrived in St. George two and a half hours late. Didn't matter. Still had plenty of time.
It was a spendy day. $175 at the gas pump, which maxed out the transaction limit and I didn't feel like running it again to top off. $299 at Costco. $94 at Walmart. $235 for a hard drive at Best Buy. $803 for the day. But that $400 of food could last the entire month, the fuel costs are offset by how little I'm driving with these longer stays, and the hard drive is just the cost of doing business. I asked about a Starlink Mini and was told they're out of stock, possibly because Starlink is about to replace that product line. Good information. I'll wait and see what comes next.
It feels great to be supplied up. Fridge packed, freezer packed, plenty of food for the next month. I feel rich. Rich in life, certainly.
I got to Greg's spot about an hour before Shannon. We're out on the cliffs of a canyon that looks like the lesser known cousin of the Grand Canyon. Technically I think it is the beginning of the Grand Canyon, the same river about 60 miles before it gets there. Absolutely stunning. I could stay a month.
For three years I've been trying to get into the backcountry of the North Rim. Always too many unanswered questions, always knowing I'd eventually meet the person who had the answers if I was patient. That person is Greg. He's cracked the code on the North Rim and he's willing to share. So after some time here we'll be doubling back and heading in. They say 90% of Grand Canyon visitors go to the South Rim. Of the 10% who go to the North Rim, only a tiny sliver get into the backcountry. I can't wait.
The road in is rough. I likened it to an ancient Roman road that hasn't been maintained in 500 years. Not a high clearance issue so much as the lumpiest half mile I've ever driven. Enough to keep most people out. Right as I finished that stretch I heard a crash in the back of the van. All my music gear had slid off the bed and dropped four feet to the floor. Brief mini heart attack. It appears to be fine but I haven't tested it yet. I will never drive with it unsecured again.
I rode out on my bike to meet Shannon at the gate and escort her in. The directions are tricky, Google Maps fails out here but OnX works perfectly, and there were a couple of spots I wanted to flag. She got through without a problem.
Back at camp I set up a cooking station and made tacos. Then I strung my 100 foot lights from the van across Greg's bus, we built a fire, and the full moon came up over the mountains perfectly across the canyon from us as we sat around the campfire. You couldn't have picked a better spot for it to rise.
One thing I like about Greg: he's early to bed, early to rise. Really early. He wakes at 3am every day, meditates, does breathing exercises, then gets into his work. I'm fully on board with that philosophy.
I slept with my back doors and side door open, screens in. At 2:55am I heard footsteps crunching around camp and peeked out to check on my bike. Of course it was fine. The full moon was pouring through the open back of the van, bright enough to read by. I lay there wide awake for a couple of hours, content as can be, before drifting back to sleep.
In the morning I lay in bed for about an hour in a half-awake state. Shannon was parked next to me and I could hear a podcast playing quietly. I started getting into it. Wow, I thought, Shannon listens to great podcasts. Really interesting stuff. After about an hour I realized it was coming from my own phone, right next to my ear, and I had no idea how it had started playing. It was a Lex Fridman episode. It was good though.