I got up, as planned, pretty early and made it right in time for the Sunrise in South Rim. It wasn’t spectacular or anything like that, but the change in shades of various colors was nevertheless enjoyable. Needless to mention that I took quite a few pictures and soon, around 6.30 am MT, started my journey to the Meteorite Crater Center. I am glad that I stopped in Valle for gas and the lady at the counter gave me easier-to-follow directions (than Yahoo! Maps had done). Road condition was so good and the traffic was so thin on I-40 East that I went past 100 mph mark again - this time to check the repeatability of my first attempt. Meteorite Crater Center is literally in the midst of nowhere - about 6 miles South of the highway and with absolutely no clue about its presence.

I thought an entry fee of $ 12 was quite cheap, given that they also offered an hour long guided rim tour or interested tourists, at no extra cost. I went upto the View Point, took some pictures, met a Physics grad who worked on some cool thing for her thesis and went on the guided tour. Bob Kruse, my tour guide, aged 65+, was in my opinion, extremely energetic and very clear in his explanation of the facts about the crater, and its history. As usual, I took several pictures and I did something that I had never done before : I talked to Bob about having a group picture and everybody agreed. The picture was taken from the first, now extinct, museum on the rim of the crater. Many thought I was some journalist for a magazine!. After taking down everyone’s email address and eating at the SubWay, I started my return journey to the Grand Canyon. Just for sheer pleasure of it, I went past 100 mph once more on I-40 West. While driving along, I noticed a cargo train, travelling on a track parallel to I-40 East. Since trains aren’t very common in Houghton area, I decided to get a picture of it. I had to drive at 100+ again to go past that train. Incidentally, I had driven so fast that I had to wait a few minutes before the train appeared!

On AZ-64/AZ-180, I visited Kaibab lake and out of some wierd curiosity, I stopped in the Grand Canyon Airport (in Tusayan) just to take some pictures of low flying aircrafts/helicopters. Little did I know that the helicopter ride over the canyon costed so less. There seemed no way I could pass this and signed up for the 3.15 pm MT ride. My co-passengers were a family from Bolivia, I have no words to explain what I saw in my second wild thing - probably the simplest way would be to write WOW and repeat it a 100 million times or write out all the exclamatory superlatives : it still wouldn’t be a good enough expression of one’s feelings. The ride lasted about 40 minutes. Only time I got scared to death was during a near 270 degree turn coming into the Canyon from the North side. Needless to mention that I took some of my best pictures. After taking a copy of the group picture, signed by Tim (Guiding Pilot) and my fellow passengers, I headed back into the Canyon.

I stopped in Mather Point, near the entrance, which offers spectacular views of the canyon, in all directions. My camera seems to be attracting lot of attention and I have no doubt in my mind about the quality of pictures/service it has been giving me ever since I bought it. One more joined my camera’s fan club and she gave me her email address, so that I could mail her the details of the camera, accessories and link to the site from where I bought.

I got into this restaurant, attached to the Bright Angel Lodge, and had some very tasty food. Trailed Chilli or something like that was its name - it tasted too good, and was filling too. Wish I knew about it yesterday, for it would have helped me reduce my headache. I desperately wanted to cancel the Soft Water Rafting and go hiking down the Bright Angel Trail to the Plateau Point instead. But the lady at the counter (Kathleen Tiedge) refused to cancel, citing a 48 hour notice restriction. I started staring at the night sky in disappointment : but as is almost everything here, it was just amazing - with stars and other objects visible all around, right to the eye-level…