Grand Canyon East Rim, AZ - May 2006

Since we did not have reservations at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, our plan was to stay at Jacob's Lake -- about 45 miles north of the park's entrance. It was the closest campground that was open at the time (DeMotte CG was closer, but was still closed for renovations.) Anyway, when we got to Jacob's Lake we called the park to see what was available. They said they had nothing that day, but told us that if we arrived at eight the next morning, there might be a few cancellations. They also told us that there was dispersed camping (basically any flat spot off of the many forest service roads in the area) outside the park as long as we stayed 1/4 mile off the highway. Since we would need to get an early start to arrive at the campground by eight the next morning, we decided to find a dispersed camping spot that was closer to the park than Jacob's Lake.

I had already done my homework and had discovered some recommendations for neat places to stay in the dispersed camping areas -- one area in particular was highly recommended and it was called the East Rim. It was about 20 miles away from the park's gate and about six miles off of the main highway down a very dusty dirt road. We arrived at the area with both RV and car covered in about an inch of dirt and discovered about a dozen sites -- not much more than wide spots in the road -- but all of them having pretty incredible views out over the eastern portion of the Grand Canyon. The views weren't as spectacular as at the North Rim, but pretty great in their own right.

It took us several passes to maneuver the RV into a somewhat level condition and when we were done, we had the nose of the RV within 10' of a very sharp drop off into the canyon. The elevation was around 8,700', so the little amount of exertion that I did getting set up left me breathless. It also made me nervous for the dogs to be running loose, so we had them hooked up to their long leads. We enjoyed sitting outside that afternoon and looking out over the view. As the sun went down, we took a walk around the area to see if anyone else was there, but did not see any other campers.

Since there were no other campers in this remote spot, I must admit that that made me rather anxious. While I'm not fond of sardine style RV parks, I learned that I'm also not that fond of total isolation either. I spent a very restless night listening to every little noise and worrying about what we'd have to do in an emergency since we had no cell phone service and it was six miles to the road and 25 more miles to anything resembling civilization. I was very happy to see the sun come up the next morning and was more than ready to return to civilization.

We all (doggies included) said goodbye to our remote camp site early the next morning and drove back out the six mile dirt road -- adding yet another inch of dust on the RV and car. The back of the RV was so dirty afterwards that we could hardly read the large Lazy Daze logo and our rear window was blacked out with dust. We arrived at the Grand Canyon by 8:00, got in line and were tickled to secure the last available campsite.