We arrived in Las Vegas Friday evening and drove to Boulder City to stay at the Hoover Dam Lodge to allow us a little more time the next day to drive to the South Rim (we would also lose an hour in time when we crossed over into Arizona). After Norah opened her birthday cards and presents Saturday morning (Happy 10th Birthday Norah!), we hit the road. We made stops in Kingman for lunch and in Williams for groceries and arrived at the South Rim mid-afternoon.

Steve went for a run on the Bright Angel trail (down to Indian Gardens and back in 1 hr 40 minutes) and Norah and I played tourist. We visited the art exhibit at Kolb Studio, walked along the rim to The Hopi House and Verkamps Visitor Center, and watched sunset. We met Steve at Bright Angel Lodge for dinner and we went to the market to get our few last supplies. This is when we found out they had NO gas canisters. Our options were basically drive 160 miles to Flagstaff and back for fuel or figure out how to go without. We decided to reconfigure out food items so we didn't need a stove. This turned out to mostly be a non-issue, the sticking point being Steve would have to go without coffee for three days. Three. Days. THREE DAYS. It was tough, but he made it. ;)

We stayed overnight at Maswick Lodge, got packed up, and were ready to go!