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Welcome to THE home of Grand Canyon hiking. If it happens below the rim—from short day hikes to Rim2Rims and beyond—you'll learn all the tips and tricks to have your safest and most memorable Grand Canyon experience.
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This is the Grand Canyon Hiker Dude Show presented by Hiken. Hiking plus kinship. That's Hiken. Together, we roam. Here's your host, my hubby, and cofounder of Hiken, Brian Special.
Brian:Thank you, Zena. Hey. I wanna mention that we've got some new tees and hoodies available at hiken.club with all profits going to help those affected by the North Rim fire, every cent. We've got two new designs, North Rim Rising and North Rim Strong. Both feature Brighty the Burrow and the Grand Canyon Lodge itself.
Brian:We've got them in unisex sizes and women's cuts. So if you'd like to contribute to the cause, please go to hikin.club, hikin.club, and grab yourself one. You get a shirt or hoodie and the knowledge that a good portion of your purchase will go to those who need it. Our goal is to be able to donate $10,000 on behalf of our community, and man, we are not too far away. So please help us get over the hump.
Brian:Again, that is at hiking.club, hikin.club. Well, speaking of Brighty, I think it caught a lot of us off guard on Friday when we saw some photos of the Brighty statue in the back of a pickup truck on its way to the South Rim for repairs. The damage does not appear nearly as bad as we'd feared, and hopefully, Bridey can be restored soon, but I do hope they leave some of that damage visible, you know, as a reminder of what happened and a symbol of the resilience that's been shown already and will no doubt continue to be shown over the coming years. While the Dragon Bravo fire is still burning below the North Rim, but they do seem to have a pretty good handle on it, at least as of today. They finally got some rain and higher humidity over the fire, so the acreage has only increased by a few over the past three days.
Brian:They've eliminated the night shift for firefighters and moved to more of a suppression repair operation, which means they're beginning to repair the more than 300 miles of fire line, including more than 250 of it cut by bulldozers. So a lot of work remains, but the destruction itself seems to be just about over. Now we still don't know about the condition of the Upper North Kaibab Trail. You know, there really does seem to be a mandate from the park superintendent to not communicate about the fire, which is beyond disappointing. Not just for hikers, of course, but much more so for park employees who have been displaced and more than a month later still don't have answers about the homes and belongings they left behind.
Brian:You would think that would be the top priority of the superintendent. But considering this fire started naturally but was allowed to continue as a controlled burn before getting out of control and becoming the biggest wildfire in the recorded history of Grand Canyon, there does appear to be a conscious effort from the man who would have had to have signed off on that decision, superintendent Ed Keeble, to stay completely out of the public eye. And let me just say, you know, we should expect much, much more from our public officials. We will talk more about all this during the conversation that you are about to hear. Well, I'm sure just about all of you are familiar with today's guest.
Brian:He's the YouTube famous hiking guy of hikingguy.com. His real name is Chris Hazzard, and he's known to his 136,000 YouTube followers as a trusted guide for whatever hiking adventure they are considering. His videos are just so detailed and so thorough from trail guides to gear reviews. Hiking guy does it all. And like all of us, he is a huge fan of hiking the Grand Canyon.
Brian:You know, as most great brands are, hikingguide.com was born of solving a problem, namely helping hikers plan their adventures and navigate the trails in the days before technology made it easier. Chris Hazzard, the hiking guy on the Grand Canyon Hiker Dude show powered by Hiking. Hiking plus kinship, that's Hiking. Together, we roam.
Cris:People would come out to California where I just moved and they would ask me, you know, I saw you did this hike or I heard about this. How do I do this? And at the time, this is 02/2012, there's guidebooks. There's not a million apps you can get to navigate. There's not a million blogs.
Cris:There's not really YouTube for trail guides. So I just made real simple trail guides like a picture with like an arrow plastered on it. Make a right in four miles at this junction. Know? Go four miles and you know, we're at the summit, that type of thing.
Cris:And I was sharing them and somebody was like, you should really just put this online because people will benefit from this. So I just made a blog. You know, at the time it was called a blog. I don't call it a blog anymore, but threw them online and I had Google Analytics on there and I just checked back a few months later and the pages had exploded. You know, a ton of organic traffic, people finding it through SEO.
Cris:And I was getting emails from people, thank you for these directions, they were so helpful. And I just went from there. It was a hobby, I had a job at the time, I was a partner at ad agency. I just got into YouTube from there because I figured if I can give still directions, wouldn't it be great if I could do like a POV video of what you would expect on this hike if you were doing it yourself? So I started shooting little POV videos with a GoPro and putting them on YouTube, And it just sort of blossomed from there.
Cris:Fast forward right before COVID, luckily we had sold our business. So I decided to do this full time. I was starting to do like in person guides. So I had I took the Knowles classes and I had outfitters insurance and got permits and I would take people different places in Southern California. And then COVID hit and I wasn't able to do those in person guides.
Cris:And I just made a decision to just do this purely online YouTube and the web because I realized I could help a lot more people by devoting my time to doing these online guides and offering tips on how to stay safe and how to read maps and different things like that than I could if I was taking like a small group of people out. So that's that's how I got here, today I I do this full time, knock on wood.
Brian:And make enough to make a living off of it, I I assume.
Cris:Just just enough, you know. Yeah. Luckily luckily my wife works too, so Well, your wife works
Brian:and you had you had the exit event, which I'm sure helped as well and gave you a lot of freedom.
Cris:It it wasn't, wasn't like selling a Uber or something big, but it was enough to get me through COVID and I'm grateful for all that stuff.
Brian:Man, I just look back and technology has changed so much. You're talking about 2012. It wasn't that long ago. Essentially, was for the hiking world, was it was MapQuest. Right?
Brian:It was printing out directions is what it was then. Could you ever imagine that it would evolve to what it is today?
Cris:It's amazing. It's good because it gets more people outside. Know not everyone's into that, but public lands for me or for the public, I appreciate that more people are able to enjoy the outdoors and and hopefully do it a little bit more effectively. But of course, you know, there's downsides too. If you in the old days, you'd have to research a hike a little bit more.
Cris:You'd have to kinda know where you're going, some of the landmarks around around the hike. And today people follow a dot on a on a line on all trails, you know, which can get you in trouble. But hopefully a little you know, people go a little bit farther than that. And yeah, it's it's it's amazing what's what's out there and how that landscape has has changed.
Brian:How long do these videos take you to do? Because I have a lifetime, basically a career built in television news and production and things like that. And so I see what you do, and it blows me away because I know how much time that that actually takes it. The people who are consuming that content would just have no idea how much time and energy and effort and pain goes into producing something at that level. How long do those take you to do?
Cris:Yeah. I appreciate that. Days, twenty, thirty hours depending on I how long it have a background actually in video production. So I worked for in the olden days as a camera man. I worked in I learned after effects and motion graphics.
Cris:I've done some music videos back when those were a thing. And the company that I mentioned earlier that I'd started, we used to do promotional videos for big companies, for big magazines and different companies. So I have some background in video production, but the difference now is that I used to be a director, so I would worked as cameraman, motion graphics and directors, producer. You know, you plan it out and you have to do all the logistics. Now I do everything, which in some ways is easier because I don't have to explain anything to anyone.
Cris:But in other ways, obviously, you just have to it's a lot of grunt work.
Brian:You know, I'm the same way. One man band everything that that you produce, and it is it can be easier that way. It's amazing how how how you can take a GoPro, or I take the Action four. I think it's the best piece of kit I have ever owned And in my you can take that and create this, you know, super high quality production. But what my wife and I always talk about, it's so funny, and to to your point and what you're doing, it's like it feels like I don't know.
Brian:It's like we have this culmination of a lifetime's worth of skills that we've developed through our careers, and now we've managed to turn that into something that we're passionate about and we actually like doing and and and channeling it that way. It's pretty awesome, isn't it?
Cris:It's awesome. Look back on that a lot because there were definitely times over the years, you know, as a jack of all trades, also learned like web development, different things. Yeah. Where I was just very unhappy and I was like, what am I doing? Like, you know, this is I don't want to sit in front of a computer all day And you know, here I am and I have I can make a website.
Cris:I can make videos. I can plan things out. I you know? And it all sort of, you know, ties in nicely dovetails nicely together.
Brian:Chris, I wanna go back to July 12, which was the longest month and three days ago, I think, of my life, because it feels like it was a year ago. And that was the night, it was a Saturday night, and we started to get word that this fire, this controlled burn on the North Rim had started to get out of control. And it was the first time that we learned about the evacuation order on the North Rim. And suddenly, North Rim employees were scrambling for the exits, so to speak, with almost no notice, 10 in some cases, and forced to leave everything behind. That night, we go to bed, wake up on July 13, Sunday morning.
Brian:I'll never forget it. I happened to be on the the call that the park was having with their with their employees and with residents. And I sat there and listened as the superintendent Ed Keeble said, we've lost the lodge. And I will never forget those words as long as I get it was as long as I live. It was a visceral emotional reaction that I had when I was like, are you the lodge is gone.
Brian:I was just there two months ago. So I'm curious just, you know, you in Southern California, as connected to the Grand Canyon community day to day, but this this huge influencer in the in the hiking world. What was your reaction when you first heard the news?
Cris:I mean, the visceral reaction was it felt like a gut punch. I was just like, woah. What? It's just like you said, it just happened so quickly. I'm a junkie on Watch Judy, the app where you can monitor the fires because there's so many fires.
Cris:It affects my life directly as somebody who makes guides needs to keep them updated. Here in Southern California, I'd have a hard time naming you a hike that doesn't have some kind of fire damage on it. And I was watching, I saw it when it was small, it was contained. It was a little bit west of you know, North Rim. Knowing that area, I mean, there's you know, it's just tons of pines and everything.
Cris:But I was like, I guess this is gonna be okay. Have containment set up. And then all of a sudden, I woke up that morning and there were, you know, a dozen text messages like North Rim burned down. You know, have friends in the area and everything. North Rim's gone or the the North Rim Lodge is gone.
Cris:And, you know, that's when I it just was like, oh, what what just happens? And even just finding information about it right away, there was nobody really knew what was going on. Don't remember, but there wasn't really confirmation, I guess, until later that day. But it just it almost it almost felt like a natural disaster that you were somehow involved with, and there's confusion, and you're not you know, you feel you feel horrible for the people there. You're not sure what's going on.
Cris:And it was just very uneasy and just devastating.
Brian:Why do you think that that we had that visceral reaction to it? What is it about the North Rim that makes us have that kind of reaction?
Cris:Yeah. It's a good question. Mean, it just I'm lucky because I get to travel all over the country and see all these really beautiful areas, but there's something about the Grand Canyon that's just otherworldly, right? And then the North Rim is a whole different thing and it's remote and almost unspoiled especially when you contrast it to like the South Rim and It's just such a pristine and beautiful place. Just to see that devastated even even the lodge.
Cris:That lodge was my favorite lodge hands down out of all the parks. Not even close. I mean, the dining room there, I'd gone there many times with the wife. Would do some version of the Great Circle. We'd do Zion and North Rim and Utah, but we'd always stop there.
Cris:We'd camp that North Rim Camping. That was such a great I don't know how much of that's left, but that was such a great campground too because there were some spots there that were tent sites where you could see into the canyon. There are parts that are closer to the general store where people had their RVs, but you could go a little bit farther and get these beautiful views and there'd be deer, mule deer walking through the camp. It was just otherworldly there. So it always had a special place and I think the remoteness I think helps too because you really had to work to get there.
Brian:Yeah. Right? One way or the other.
Cris:Yeah. So if if you went there in some way, whether you knew it before because you planned or because you got there and you figured it out, it was a special place.
Brian:I mean, was one of those places where, you know, being fortunate enough to live as close as I do, that I could be up there at the South Rim at three and a half hour in three and a half hours, and drop in on South Kaibab, and, you know, finish the day that started in the hustle and bustle of the big city and finish on the North Rim. And I would always tell people that, you know, when you're when you make a decision on whether you're gonna hike South to North or North to South when you're doing rim to rim, you know, the consensus seems to be that hiking North to South is easier. I don't I don't really necessarily think it is. But even if it is, you know, marginally more difficult to hike from south to north, it is so worth it to finish in the pines, and in the quiet, and the silence of the North Rim, the serenity. And even if you have to make that two mile walk along the bridal path and end up at the lodge, right, after that long hike, it's still like every step you take toward the lodge is a step back in time, or to to to a simpler time.
Brian:Right? And then you step into the lodge, and everything just melts away, you know? And to your point, to the dining room, even when you would walk into the lodge, and and it's the old school check-in desk, right, with the keys Mhmm. Behind the desk there. And it just it it never stopped.
Brian:It was like everything was frozen in time. Is that the sense that you got?
Cris:Yeah. Definitely. It's it it and that's the isolation, I think. You know, it wasn't it it was there's there's not a ton of people. You really just have to wanna get there to be there, and it just feels you know, because there's no developments and you have the log cabins and all these it just it you're I mean, you you put it nicely.
Cris:It's it just felt like a different a different world. I'm with you. I I recommend going or did recommend going south to north because going north to south, I think is a little bit tougher as well just because you have that more exposed hot section between Phantom Ranch and and Havasupai Garden. But also to get up to the Bright Angel Trail after doing a 24 mile day and there's people with ice cream cones and Bluetooth speakers. For me, that was soul crushing.
Cris:I just needed to get in the car and go sit in a hotel room and get away from that or have a beer. If I could even get into like the the bar at the whatever it was, either the El Tovar or the Bright Angel there. But but the North Rim, like like you said, you just got there and you know, you had that extra two miles to walk down the bridal path, but it was it was you you felt good. You knew you knew if you did south and north that that bridal path was just just nothing. You know, you could just kind of enjoy it.
Cris:So sort of like a victory lap, you know.
Zeena:Breaking Canyon news, hike reports, and answers to all your questions. Find it all in our hiking Grand Canyon Facebook group. Inside, you'll have access to Brian, coach Arnie, and just about everyone you've ever heard on this show, all there in a safe judgment free space, geared to root each other on and help you have your best possible Grand Canyon experience. The Hikin' Grand Canyon Facebook group is the official group of the Grand Canyon Hiker Duke Show and is completely free to join. Just search for Hikin, H I K I N, Grand Canyon on Facebook and join the conversation today.
Brian:What do you hope to see? You know? You've you've been to other lodges at other national parks. You know, it's it's three years from now. It's five years from now.
Brian:What in a perfect world do you hope to see happen to the lodge, into the lodge area?
Cris:Yeah. That's a good question. I I mean, I hope they rebuild it. I I I hope it's as much as it was originally. Obviously, I like to see some things modernized.
Cris:But overall this might be just a systems thing, but I remember walking down that bridal path and feeling really good and then waiting like an hour in line for the check-in desk because That can happen. Yeah. But just some small things like that. But I mean, I think you need to keep that grands, the dining room. I think it needs to be very close to the way it was.
Cris:Now whether that happens or not, I I don't I have no idea. You would obviously know much better than I would about what what the rumblings are about what's gonna happen next. But but for me, I'd want it to be as as close to it was originally.
Brian:The only thing I would add to that is I would say, yes. Build it back as close as it was, but add Wi Fi, and I'll be happy. Yeah. And I know that's unpopular to a lot of people, but I'm always like, hey, you can choose to not use the WiFi. If you don't have WiFi, I can't choose I can't make that choice, so
Cris:Or give me the choice. Yeah. Like the TVs too. Right?
Brian:Give me the choice.
Cris:There's no TVs. That's stuff. Some people love it. Some people I I've heard people complain about that.
Brian:But we're always going to find something to complain about. We're human, man. Right?
Cris:Exactly.
Brian:So I'm curious because obviously, rim to rim is a lot of what this podcast is built around. It's lot of what our business is built around. It's a lot of what a lot of people's businesses is is built around. And now, you know, we're gonna lose that for for who knows how long. But I think I think it's safe to say it's gonna be years before we can, you know, access the North Rim from from the South Rim again.
Brian:I just looking at the fire maps and looking at the perimeters and not knowing for sure because there is still not a lot of information the Park Service is choosing to to really not talk about much. And the fire people just reached back out to me a little while ago, because I inquired about the condition of North Kaibab from Supai Tunnel to the trailhead, and they said they just don't have that information. So we're all curious about how intensely that burned, how much damage there is. We're, of course, gonna be worried about flash floods and the winter runoff and and all that stuff. So who knows how long it's gonna be before rim to rim is accessible again.
Brian:Knowing that we have so many people in our community who are laser focused on rim to rim and have now lost that opportunity. Not just for this year. I feel so bad for the people who are getting ready for September, October before the North Rim traditionally closes. But now for years to come, let's say 02/1926, 02/1927, at least, I would say. So are there bucket list hikes around?
Brian:Obviously, there are. You would know this much better than I would. What would you have people, I don't know, transition to? Is it Cactus To Clouds? Is it Whitney?
Brian:What is out there that is a bucket list hike that's similar to rim to rim that people might consider pivoting to if they're not gonna just stay in and do the canyon?
Cris:Yeah. I mean, here's the thing. There's nothing like the Grand Canyon, not just the down up, but just After this happened, was looking for an answer to that question. I was looking at Escalante and Canyonlands and different places. There's nothing quite like this.
Cris:The fact it's such a great mix of wilderness and also a developed trail with water. There's a lot of help along the way. To do something like that say in Canyonlands would be a much different exercise that I would not recommend to somebody who wasn't experienced and willing to carry like six liters of water for two days or whatever. Having said that, if I would say if people are going to the Grand Canyon South Rim anyway and the trails are open, I think doing a rim to river, South Kaibab to Phantom and then back up Bright Angel is probably as close to that experience as you're gonna get, at least like you said for several years. I I love that hike too.
Cris:I I I love that hike. And and that'll give you a taste for what you're missing. You're not gonna get the North Rim, but if if you've never been there before, you you know, you don't know what you don't know. So you'll still get you'll still get to see rock that's almost 2,000,000,000 years old, you know, the Vishnu Shist, and you'll still get that kind of experience. Outside of that, I have a lot of people in my community who do other bucket lists.
Cris:Mount Whitney, as you mentioned, is a big one. Looking at about just under 22 miles, about just under 7,000 feet of climbing. It's got a short window. This is the time to do it in the fall right now. You need a permit to do it, which was one nice thing about rim to rim is you could just do it.
Cris:The lodging was the challenge, obviously. But for Whitney, you need a permit. You could snag a last minute permit. There's not heat there, but there is altitude. That's that's a consideration, but that's a big one.
Cris:Just a cloud you mentioned, that's actually a lot harder I think for a lot of people than than rim to rim. It's a similar distance. It's like about twenty one twenty two miles, but you have 10,000 feet of climbing. The windows to do that are similar to Grand Canyon. There's the spring and the fall window.
Cris:But if it's You know, people have died on that who didn't do it the right time because of the heat exposure. But that's a fun one. Starts at Palm Springs in the Sonoran Desert and then you climb up Mount San Jacinto. You basically go from cacti in the desert up to pine trees on the summit of this mountain. Beautiful hike, but it tough and you do have some bailout points.
Cris:You don't have to go all the way up there. But that's that's an option. That might be more for somebody who's done rim to rim and maybe was gonna do it again. I think on the East Coast, the one I really like is the presidential traverse up in the White Mountains. It's it's a hike.
Cris:It goes to Mount Washington and all the the presidentials as they call them. It's a point to point hike. That's I think around 19 miles. It's got 8,000 feet of climbing, so a little more climbing, lots of ups and downs. But that's a good one if you just don't wanna travel out West, if you're on the East Coast and you just want to, you know, do something with the fitness that you might have been building up over over the years.
Cris:Another one I I forgot, you could take the West. If you're if you're gonna be out there, if you're gonna be at West and maybe you're gonna be at Zion, you could do the West Rim Trail. Used to be able to do the whole traverse in Zion from West Rim, you know, and then up the other side, but the East Rim Trail is closed indefinitely up from from the lodge. But you can do the traverse, which don't quote me. But I think it's around 30 miles or so, But that would be that would be a good one.
Cris:Long long maybe for a day hike, but, you know, those those would be the big ones. And then if you wanna do overnights, if you're planning on doing a rim to rim with maybe a couple stops along the way, then you have a lot more options. If you wanna do something similar, some good ones are Timberline Trail around Mount Hood. No permit. No quota permit required.
Cris:You just have a permit that you fill out when you get to the trailhead. That's a beautiful, beautiful hike. We're looking at about 42 miles, about 10,000 feet. That's a lot of ups and downs. But if you have that fitness and you wanna go do a, you know, overnight timberline is great.
Cris:Teton Crest Trail is a great one. And Grand Teton National Park, we're looking at about 40 miles, about nine k of climbing. That one, if you want to camp in the park, you need a permit. But the nice thing about that is on the Teton Crest Trail, part of it goes through or right next to the National Forest. So there's a little hack where you could just hop into the National Forest and camp without needing any kind of national park quota, you know, or or campsite reservation.
Cris:So there's options. If you have the fitness and you wanna use that fitness, do a tough one. And if not, and you have the time off, do something a little bit easier. Go up to the Olympics maybe. There's Ho River Trail, the Enchantments, those are ones that have two, three thousand feet of climbing.
Cris:So you can go if you've been stressing because you're not used to climbing 5,000 feet in a day, you know, go and do something the same distance, not so much climbing and enjoy it. But lots of options out there and I would just say don't not do anything. Do something with the planning. You have the time to hike, you have the fitness, use it because you don't know when things will change other places.
Brian:I mean, those are such great options. But it it listening to you also makes me just go back to what you said originally. There's there's nothing like the canyon. There's just nothing. There's a reason why it's probably the number one bucket list hike in the in the world.
Brian:And it you know, to your point, that was a great point, that it's so accessible when it comes to the help that you have along the way. It can still feel like a rugged, difficult, physical journey, but at the same time, the infrastructure that the National Park Service provides along the way does give you certainly some advantages. And to your point about rim to river, this is a big thing in our group when people will say, oh, I'm just gonna do a rim to river. It's just a rim to river. Take that just right on out of there.
Brian:Right? I mean, we're talking about a hike that I always say that use that as like your last progression before doing rim to rim. Because if you can handle rim to river, you can handle rim to rim because they are just about the same thing outside of, you know, a few more miles of flattish hiking.
Cris:Yeah. 100%. I mean, it's such a it's such a great hike. It's hard, especially I mean, the temperature has a lot to do with it, but I've done that with ice and snow up at the top of the South Rim. I've done that when it's a little bit warmer.
Cris:It's a tough hike no matter which way slice and dice it. There's a reason why every piece of National Park Service literature says, don't do the hike to the river and back in a day aimed at beginners. Because I'm sure they've had so many rescues from people doing that. I'm sure you've seen the person at the bottom wearing vans and having a school backpack on. You're like, oh god.
Cris:Every time. Hope this Yeah. Guy picks it But I I think there's I mean, you you live in this world more than I do, but there's there's people who are really into the Grand Canyon and and that that a rim to river is, like, too too commercial, too mainstream for them. You know? They would tell you, like, go hermits or go go to the Tanner Trail and connect on this and that.
Cris:And I think if if if you're new to the Grand Canyon and Rim To, Rim was your big bucket list hike and the thing that you were gonna do, there's nothing wrong with the the Rim To River. And it's it's a challenging, challenging hike. If you feel like the distance isn't as long, you know, go walk another five miles in the in the South Rim to make yourself feel better, but I'm pretty sure you're not gonna feel that.
Brian:Well, yeah. When push comes to shove, no one's gonna actually do that. You might think that, oh, I'm gonna add some more miles to this thing to make it longer. When you step foot on the surface of the South Rim after you finish that, you're not gonna feel like doing any more miles. I can almost promise you that.
Cris:There's one time I think it was the second time I did that many many moons ago. I remember going to that bar. What do you know what it is? Is it the El Tovar or the Bright Angel? That small bar at the lodge right there.
Cris:Guess it's the Bright Angel. And and having a beer right after doing that, and then like finding myself falling asleep sitting at the barstool, because I was just so wiped out. So, you know, don't don't underestimate that.
Brian:Do you have any guides for any of the off corridor trails in the canyon?
Cris:Yeah. I have Hermits Hermit Trail to Dripping Spring, also the little house at Santa Maria Spring. I have Grand View.
Brian:I
Cris:have a couple other ones. I I can't quote them all now. And I you know, I'd also say if you're gonna go do the Grand Canyon hike for the first time and this was gonna be it, now you can't do rim to rim, do the corridor trails. Don't don't do Grand View. So we just somebody's missing on Grand View.
Cris:Like that's a hardcore I mean, know, that's a hardcore trail. Hermit, Hermit not so much, but the farther you go, it gets a little more primitive. Stick to the corridor trails because they're just so well maintained that there's no ambiguity about where to go really. They're well marked, and you're gonna see other people. So if you get in trouble and you don't have like a satellite communicator or something, it's not too tough to ask for help.
Brian:I think that's great advice, man. Yeah. I don't even like venturing off the corridor trails unless I'm with someone who's been, you know, out there before and knows what they're doing just to have that that security. I think that's a great point. And again, it comes back to people not sleeping on Rim To River.
Brian:Don't sleep on Rim To River. It is still a bucket list hike, and you're still gonna get the full Grand Canyon experience.
Zeena:Shade can save your life. That's why we invested in the Grand Canyon Shade Tracker, a completely free tool that lets you see when and where you'll have shade on your hike no matter the trail, no matter the day, no matter the time. Plan your hike around maximizing your time in the shade and stay safe from the brutal canyon sun. The Grand Canyon Shade Tracker is brought to you free of charge by Hike in Grand Canyon, and you can find it at gcshadetracker.com. That's gcshadetracker.com.
Zeena:Go on. Hunt that shade and have a happier hike.
Brian:You mentioned earlier that there are so many trails in Southern California that have been affected by fire damage. So with that kind of knowledge that you have and not knowing yet the specifics, because we're still in August, the fire is 56% contained as of this morning, 145,000 acres. But we know there's damage. We know there's flash flood risks, significant flash flood risks, and especially through Bright Angel Canyon all the way to all the way to Phantom along Bright Angel Creek. But knowing what you know about fire damage on trails, what would you speculate that the future looks like for North Kaibab?
Cris:Probably a closure four years, somewhere maybe between two and five. Total closure?
Brian:Knowing the trail? Total closure? Or just near the top?
Cris:That's a good question. I don't know. Here's what I think is going to happen. There's a lot of fuel at the top past Supai Tunnel to the trailhead on North Kaibab. If that all went up, those switchbacks are going to erode.
Cris:I don't know if any of the reinforcement burned on the trail, like any of those boards that reinforce the switchbacks. Assuming that's gone, it's all burned and there's no trees or vegetation there to hold that in, I would imagine that would wash away. A lot of those switchbacks would wash away. It's a good point you made about flash floods going down into the canyon. I didn't even really go into that train of thought too high, but I'd imagine that knowing the government, knowing the park service, I imagine they would keep as much of it closed for as long as possible if there was any iota that that it would be a risk to people because of those conditions, of the the burn damage.
Cris:Even when they fix the trail, we still have to think about the facilities on the North Rim. Right? What's I mean, it looks like the the Kaibab Lodge, which is, I don't know, 20 miles or so north of of the trailhead there survived. So there might be lodging opportunities if the trail opens. I'm thinking it's gonna be a long, long time before the actual North Room Lodge opens.
Cris:So I'm not sure how that's all gonna shake out. But but I would say the trail, I wouldn't be surprised if it's closed five years.
Brian:Yeah. So
Cris:it opens back up.
Brian:You know, and we're just you know, we're just thinking out loud here, Chris, and kind of gaming this out because we don't we don't have all the information yet. It just is from experience and looking at the maps and just, you know, kind of speculating. But, you know, I want everyone to know that I I I was speaking with some very, very in the know people at the Grand Canyon this weekend. And to your point about, you you hadn't really let your train of thought go to the flooding aspect of this yet. I hadn't either.
Brian:Yeah. Because you're just worried about what's right in front of you. You're not thinking about the long term effects necessarily. But these folks that I talked to over the weekend, they're like, what's going to stop a flood through Bright Angel Canyon, down Bright Angel Creek, all the way through the box, from getting through there at a ferocity we've never seen before because of the burn scars? And what's gonna stop that from wiping out Phantom Ranch and wiping out Bright Angel Campground, and potentially wiping out new wastewater treatment plant that's right there on the bank of the Colorado?
Brian:What's gonna stop it? That's the fear that these people who know these things have. Us sitting here and wondering when North Kaibab is gonna be reopened, last week I was saying, well, maybe worst case scenario, they'll open it to Redwall Bridge at some point in the next year, because I the part above Redwall Bridge is just gonna be, to your point, what you were talking about, it's just gonna get wiped out by erosion and by the winter runoff, if not by monsoons and flash floods. So I don't know if, you know, knowing what we know, and to your point again about NPS taking a cautionary approach and the liability that they have, and who knows what's coming from above. And then you've got the box, is four and a half miles of narrow slot canyon between Phantom and the Frying Pan area where everything finally opens up.
Brian:Talk about the liability in there, because if someone gets caught in there and there's a flash flood coming, where are you gonna go? Right? Yeah. So man, we might be looking at years and years and years when you really break this all down.
Cris:Yeah. No, I I agree. I mean, that that's it's such a good point. Right? Like, how are you gonna get people out of the the the box?
Cris:Right? That that that couple miles in there, there's no helicopters gonna come in there. They're not gonna hoist anyone out. And I mean, you saw when this all happened and they had the evacuations at Phantom Ranch because of the chlorine. You know, it was a major operation.
Cris:They had helicopters getting all these people out. Imagine a flood is coming down Bright Angel Canyon, and, you know, people have minutes. People I mean, you can you can just go on YouTube and find videos of of Zion Canyon when there's flooding. You know? There's there's times when the entire Zion Canyon is just covered and there's cars moving down the road and out of the parking lots and stuff.
Cris:So, yeah, I would I would imagine I I it'll be interesting to see what happens and and I'll be I'll be interested to listen to your podcast for me for your information moving forward because a lot of you know, the damage that's gonna happen on the upper canyons there is gonna determine how long that's all closed. And if you use the South Rim closures that we have still still South Kaibab, you know, you can't go below Havasupai Garden, It's pretty long. Think that chlorine risk is out of there. I think they're just in an abundance of caution, they just keep that closed. They just would rather not have you on there to deal with another emergency when there's all these other things going on.
Cris:I wouldn't be surprised if South Rim is closed for a long time and North Rim is closed for a long long time.
Brian:Well, as of this morning, and I want to read this because again, this is this is still a bit of a breaking news story because the fire is still burning. And let me just do read this to everyone because in the past couple of days, we haven't even talked about Roaring Springs, which provides the drinking water, not just for the North Rim, but for the South Rim as well. So an incredibly valuable asset that needs to be protected. And as of the lodge going up, you know, they were talking almost immediately after the fire teams were about preventative measures and protective measures that they were gonna take at the Roaring Springs pump house. And, Chris, you know as well as I do how deep that is in the canyon and how unfathomable it is to even think that a fire that starts on the North Rim can get all the way down there.
Brian:That was four or five weeks ago. As of a couple of days ago, they were talking in the briefing again about Roaring Springs as this as this fire has dove deeper into the canyon. And so I I reached out and asked for help, asked for what was going on with Roaring Springs because you don't get necessarily specific answers in the briefings that they give. They're very general, and there's no opportunity to ask questions. So what they said to me was they said Roaring Springs is one of the values at risk that has been identified by the agencies.
Brian:The reason we keep mentioning it is because firefighters are still taking active measures to protect it. The fire has not moved right to that area, but we continue to stay prepared in the event that it does. So even after all this time, and even with the fire burning a pretty good distance away from where Roaring Springs is, but above it, I mean, they're not taking any chances. How mind blowing is that to think about Roaring Springs as deep as it is in the canyon still being a threat all these weeks later? It's it's amazing.
Cris:And I don't know if you saw, it's probably a week ago, I guess the winds shifted and that area started burning again. I was looking at the satellite hotspots and it was going downhill, which you don't see a whole lot. Right? Because it's hot, it goes up. But it was going downhill and there's a new if you look at the official perimeter from I think a week ago or so, there's new trail damage or burn damage down to the old Bright Angel Trail, the one that went up from Roaring Springs there.
Cris:So I think they're worried that if the wind shifts again, it gets dry, that it could just and and you know, in the canyon or any canyon, there's there's like micro climates and there's winds funneling down canyons in ways you wouldn't necessarily expect. I could see that happening there and just getting pushed down, you know, the canyon because Roaring Springs is isn't a canyon, it's a financial canyon. I think if that were to go, obviously that would be a huge deal just because know, the spring will be there, but the the there's I think there's a small pump there. I think the pipeline to the North Rim, I'm not sure what happened with that because that wasn't part of the pipeline rehabilitation going from the North Rim to Roaring Springs. I'm not sure what the temperature that that pipe would maybe melt at.
Cris:Like who even knows if they're gonna be able to get water from there? But even downstream, like you said, it's it's gonna be you know, who knows what what contaminants are gonna go into the water? I saw on the news and on one of your local Phoenix news stations last week that they're gonna do a study on the water because of the runoff from different maybe chemicals or fire retardants or just ash and, you know, sediment in there. But it it it has such a potential major impact on the entire Grand Canyon, that Roaring Springs area that that I get it. I get why they told you that because it's it's huge.
Cris:If that goes down, a lot goes down.
Brian:Yeah. And it's it's been hard to watch the media, the national media especially, just kinda lose interest, you know, after the lodge burned down. Yeah. No one died. No one's hurt.
Brian:So they kinda move on to the next story. And and I'll still hear reports in the morning where they'll give an update on the Dragon Bravo fire burning on the North Rim. They always say on the North Rim. Yeah. Well, guys, you know, I hate to tell you, but this thing has gone over 4,000 vertical feet below the rim at this point in some places, in two places, on the East and the West side of the fire.
Brian:And they're still having a lot of problems with it on the on the East side where it has gotten within a mile of the the Colorado. I mean, it's it's just unfathomable. So vast swaths of the canyon are burning. The Grand Canyon, one of the seven natural wonders of the world is burning right now, and it seems like the world's attention has just moved on to the the the next political outrage. It's it's crazy.
Cris:Yeah. No. I I agree. It's it's been it's been frustrating to watch it. The other thing is everyone's always looking at the containment percentage.
Cris:Oh, it went up. It went down. Where it, you know, it doesn't tell the whole story. And if you look at that eastern part, which as you know, knowing the area, there's nothing there. I mean, there's some trails, some forest service roads.
Cris:I mean, that area is really remote. If that whole area goes up, I mean, that would have a huge effect just on the whole ecosystem, I'd imagine, you know, a part of that whole North Rim kind of continuum that goes on. But also if you look how far it's gone to the North, it's almost joined up with the perimeter of the White Sage fire. Yeah. Right?
Cris:I mean, obviously you know, when when the North when when it was first happening, no one thought the North Rim Lodge would burn. And then I remember watching briefings after the North Rim Lodge burned, and they were saying, oh, we don't think the the the Kaibab Lodge is in danger. That's the one that's 20 miles north.
Brian:Yeah.
Cris:You know? And then they have to put You know, they saved it, thank God.
Brian:It was a
Cris:cross Yeah. Yeah. The pictures, if you haven't seen them, they're on their Facebook page, but they have these amazing pictures. Now it's almost up to the White Sage. I mean, it's just and I think to your point about people moving on, I think the NPS has done a poor job at sharing this with the public.
Cris:I I think it would behoove them to get the public on their side in the short term and on the long term. They did this really great I'm sure everyone saw it now, but the the helicopter flyover of the lodge. They they really need more of that so that the world understands what's happening because it's not just awareness now, but it's gonna need to be in people's minds when later they're rebuilding it. And there's gonna be, you know, charities or maybe there's gonna be things for businesses that are gonna go out of business because everything is gone. Like as you know, but like in the North Rim specifically, not that there was a whole lot up there, but this is gonna affect everybody.
Cris:And I don't see how it benefits the fire the the the park service to not release more footage and keep it fresh in people's minds.
Brian:Well, I appreciate you saying that, and you've kinda opened the door for me, and I'm gonna I'm gonna push it open. You've given me the opportunity to, so I appreciate that, Chris. Listen. The job that has been done by superintendent Ed Keeble has been horrific, and it's outrageous, and it's wrong. And the fact that he has not been out front publicly a single time, to my knowledge, on camera speaking about this, showing empathy, showing remorse for the decision that was made, that by the way would be understandable, and people would forgive much more they might forgive it if someone's out and speaking to it, and taking accountability.
Brian:Instead, the philosophy seems to be that they're just gonna hide, and they're say just not anything and pretend that nothing happened, and they know that they're gonna face the music at some point. But to your point about standing up and showing accountability and getting in front of it, and starting to create their own narrative about this situation, and getting some public sympathy and understanding only behooves them. Doing what they're doing and hiding makes it a million times worse. And I think it's an outrage that last week there were two public meetings, one in Fredonia and one in Page, where the public was out there, the fire crews were out there, the leadership from all these agencies are out there, and the National Park Service, Grand Canyon National Park, sent a liaison who had been on scene. He was from another park, and he had been on scene for eight days.
Brian:And the questions that he was getting, he wasn't able to answer because he didn't have the historical knowledge of what had happened over the previous month. And the poor people from the North Rim who have been displaced who are standing there saying, we aren't getting answers. When can we go back and know what happened to our homes? When can we go retrieve our belongings? No one is talking to us, and there's no one there who can represent the park service or Grand Canyon National Park and answer these poor people's questions who have been affected.
Brian:I find it absolutely outrageous, and I think it's a dereliction of duty. I think it's a failure of leadership, and it starts at the top. I don't blame the people below Ed Keeble. They are following directions, following orders. They have jobs to do.
Brian:I understand that completely. But where is the superintendent? This is the biggest tragedy in the history of Grand Canyon when it comes to land loss, and he's nowhere to be seen. And it's an outrage. So Chris, thank you for giving me the opportunity to walk through that door.
Brian:Told you I was gonna kick it down, man.
Cris:I'm glad you said it. I mean, I'm with you a 100%. And unfortunately, I've seen this type of thing when we've had fires here in Southern California too. It depends on the fire, but sometimes people don't know when can I go back? Who do I call?
Cris:Right. It's just confusion. You'd think today, you know, we we can land spaceships. SpaceX rockets can go into space and come back down and land on platforms. People have been to the moon.
Cris:You think we could figure out a more structured or a more effective framework for dealing with natural disasters and emergencies. I know everyone's different, but there's got to be best practices here that you know, obviously a lot of it's at at the discretion of the people who are in charge, but there there should just be some some norms and standards because this is it just you you just feel let down by by the people who are supposed to be protecting the places you love.
Brian:It doesn't even have to be best practices. It can be common sense and common decency, right, to do these things. Right? Just just the very basics. Right?
Brian:And I and personally, I'm outraged by this. I reached out to the Park Service on three separate occasions, asking questions about North Kaibab, asking questions about other things, asking if we're gonna be able to actually ask questions to people so that we can get answers. Right? Because this is we have a we have a large platform for the Grand Canyon. They know who we are.
Brian:They know damn well who the Grand Canyon Hiker Dude show is. Trust me on that. And they didn't even bother responding to the inquiries that I put out there. Not a no comment, not a we don't know, nothing. Just completely ignored.
Brian:And I find it I just find it outrageous. That's a slap in the face, not to me, but to our entire community, the public, who they are supposed to be serving. And again, I blame Ed Keeble for that. He's the one who is putting these mandates out there to not talk. It's obvious.
Brian:And if that's not the case, NPS, come out and say something. Talk. Let's hear it. Tell us what the real story is. This is just an outrage.
Cris:No. I I agree with you a 100%. Mean, especially, there there's so many stakeholders or so many businesses like yours that are all tied into this situation. And to keep you guys out of the dark, you know, in the dark about this is just like you said, it's just you know, it's it's unacceptable, unconscionable. It's it's I I I don't I I don't understand.
Cris:But you know, everyone's not everyone is decent and has common sense and
Brian:Here's the here's the problem. Honorable. Right? Here's the problem. It's a it's a classic case.
Brian:And again, I'm going to say this because it's it's my opinion, but it's also from a lifetime in the media and in journalism. It's obvious that they're it's a cover your ass kinda thing. Right? Because Yep. When it comes down to it, if this had been a natural fire that did not have a containing control strategy placed on it by the decision makers at the park service, they would be out in front, and they would be doing all the things we said.
Brian:But the bottom line in this situation, and it needs to be known, and we are not gonna sit here and cast blame on people because people do make mistakes, We have empathy for that. But when you don't talk, it leads to me saying things like this, which is the ultimate decision maker per NPS regulations, NPS fire regulations, who has to sign off on a controlled burn, a naturally caused fire like this one was. It started on July 4 on the North Rim caused by lightning, and they decided to do a contain and confine strategy, not a full suppression strategy. That needs to be signed off on because what if things go wrong? Right?
Brian:They have a hierarchy. They have a Mhmm. They have protocol they have to follow. Ed Keeble, the superintendent of Grand Canyon National Park, is required to be the one who signs off on that. So it makes a little bit more sense of why you're not hearing anything from Grand Canyon National Park when you have that information.
Cris:It's just so disappointing on a lot of levels. I think a lot of us these days are disappointed with a lot of things that are happening on public lands and some of the choices. This is just all part of it. There's not a head of the National Park Service confirmed by the Senate. There hasn't been for a long time.
Cris:They're just acting people. I I think, you know, once I can echo what you said about, you know, there's two levels of people working in public lands in the park service. There's like the boots of the ground. There's lower level people who are taking orders and doing their best. And then you get up to a certain level and it gets very political, and it's all about CYA.
Cris:And it's it's sad, you know, for people who love the outdoors. That's just not a good situation.
Brian:We could talk forever, Chris. I'm so grateful that that you came on, and and I'm kinda sorry, but kinda not that you opened that door for me to say what I wanted to say. It's been it's
Cris:just I'm glad to say it.
Brian:Pent up and built up inside me. Had I have to say something, because I feel like if you don't challenge authority, nothing will ever change. Right? Accountability and transparency from public agencies, I just don't have a tolerance for when they ignore that, and they forget that not only do they work for the public, they are the public, and they have a duty to keep us informed with at least basic information. But to wrap this whole thing up, we're a hiking show, and this is about people building up for a bucket list iconic adventure.
Brian:They can't do rim to rim anymore. Just give me a give me give me one minute, and and and talk about why someone should still, despite all of this, come to the Grand Canyon and and and, you know, just pivot to Rim to River or something like that. You're the hiking guy. Sell it. Sell him.
Brian:Come on, Chris.
Cris:Here's here's the deal. I get to go to do hikes country, all over the world. The the best hikes. I was just up in the Olympics. I've been all over.
Cris:And there's a reason why I go back to the Grand Canyon every year. I go every year and hike the Grand Canyon because there's nothing else like it. There's nothing else. Like I mentioned earlier, you go to the bottom, there's there's stone. It's like 2,000,000,000 years old.
Cris:I think the earth is like just under 5,000,000,000 years old. Like, just blows my mind. It's such a beautiful hike, and there's there's nothing else like it. So if you have plans and you're gonna do rim to rim, go South Rim, support the local businesses there. I'm sure everyone needs the help at this point and do rim to river.
Cris:And if the conditions aren't bad, go do the Rim Trail. Or, you know, if if it's too hot to do rim to river, do all 13 miles of the Rim Trail. It's still beautiful. There there's so many great places to hike there. And you'd you'd you'd be a fool to to miss out on that just because all of this is happening on the North Rim.
Brian:And the two two big things on top of that that I'll just add is, number one, you can do it any time of the year, whereas rim to rim is limited from May to October. You can do it any time of the year, and that's especially important because now you can do it in the best times of the year, which would be November, you know, into December, and then in the springtime as well. So you can avoid the heat, which we talk about ad nauseam here about the dangers of hiking the canyon in the heat. You can avoid that altogether. Rim to rivers it, man.
Brian:I agree with everything you said, Chris.
Cris:And winter in the Grand Canyon, if you didn't know, there there's snow on the South Rim sometimes. Yeah. And it's beautiful. It's it's you wouldn't even expect it. You know, people have an image of the Grand Canyon.
Cris:It's sort of like, you know, Wile E. Coyote desert kind of place. It's not like that. You know, the snow there. It's it's absolutely beautiful.
Cris:Like you said, you don't have to go when the heat is a problem, and that's what gets most people as as you know into trouble is the heats. Go in the winter, and if it is too hot, do the rim trail and, you know, you you'd be good. You'll be golden.
Brian:And better to be too cold than too hot when you're hiking into the inner canyon. I mean, worst case scenario is you're gonna have some micro spikes you'll have to put on for the first mile down or so, maybe longer, but it's gonna get nicer and nicer as you get lower and lower. That's the beauty of hiking into a canyon. The best plan. Thank you so much for your time, man.
Brian:It was an honor for us to to have you on. Again, I apologize for going off the rails a little bit there with with some obviously very pent up emotions about how this thing is being handled by Ed Keeble and Grand Canyon National Park. But thank you so much for your time. It it was an honor and we'll send be sending people your way as as always. You're you're a gift to the to the hiking community in general.
Brian:So thank you so much.
Cris:Thank you so much for having me on. It was a pleasure. This went by. It felt like two seconds. I could talk I could talk hiking in Grand Canyon with you, you know, till sundown.
Cris:So thank you so much for having me on.
Brian:Chris Hazzard, The Hiking Guy. You can find him on YouTube under the hiking guy handle and at hiking guy dot com, which is just an invaluable resource. You can tell Chris' heart and soul is in everything he does, so please go support him as I know many of you already do. Alright. I know it's been pretty bleak here in our community since this fire started, but I also know most of you have continued your training and that is music to Coach Arnie's ears.
Brian:For Coach, it's business as usual and that includes addressing the root cause of the number one ailment he's asked about.
Coach Arnie:Hey, guys. This is coach Arnie with another Grand Canyon tip of the week. And, again, big thanks to Brian for allowing me to share some wisdom with you guys as we are getting ready for whatever adventure that we are planning for and hopefully something fun in the Grand Canyon. So here we go. It's not a knee issue.
Coach Arnie:And you might be saying, what? What do you mean by that, coach? The second most question that I am asked or that I receive is about knee pain. The first is about foot pain. It's probably a foot issue or a hip issue way before it becomes a knee issue because bad foot placement puts pressure on your hip which leads to knee pain.
Coach Arnie:So here's your tip. You gotta strengthen your feet. You gotta strengthen your feet. And people that know coach Arnie are constantly hearing him talk about your feet, and there's a big reason for that. Because bad foot placement, bad foot posture, weak feet leads to a lot of other problems.
Coach Arnie:And the first one is probably a hip issue. It probably leads to your glutes being either put in a bad position or being exposing weak hips, which eventually will lead to that painful knee problem. Okay? And and especially when we're talking about our hips, we're talking about that glute medius, which you may have hear heard me talk about before. That glute medius could lead to IT band problems and, again, knee pain.
Coach Arnie:So the knee the pain in that knee that you're feeling is the result of all these other things happening. So here's the key. You've gotta be consistent. You've gotta be consistent with your exercises to eliminate the foot pain, to eliminate the hip weakness. And if if you take care of those two things, you're gonna have less knee pain.
Coach Arnie:And it must be a regular part of your program. It can't be something you're going to work in. It has to be something you do. Alright. So there you go.
Coach Arnie:It's not knee pain. It's probably foot or hip weakness. Love you guys. Get busy.
Brian:Coach Arnie. Arnie Fonseca junior, our Canyon Coach and exercise physiologist. His contact information is in the show notes. Well, as far as we know, the Trans Canyon Waterline Project has not been affected by the North Rim Fire, which means the October 1 reopening of the River Trail and access to Bright Angel Trail from the river is still on schedule until we hear otherwise. That would at least make the traditional rim to river route accessible again and if it holds, I hope to see you out there.
Brian:It's been a long time and that's really the one piece of good news we still hope becomes reality. Alright. That's it for now. My name is Brian Special encouraging you as always to go hike the canyon now more than ever. Take that first step.
Brian:Embrace the journey. And when you get there, whether it's for time goals or taking your time, just hike your own hike and savor every step in the still magnificent Grand Canyon. We'll see you next time on the Grand Canyon Hiker Dude Show powered by Hiken. Hiking plus kinship, that's Hiken. Visit us at hiking.club.
Brian:Hiking. Together, we roam.