My Family Vacation to Arizona- Part 2

We stayed at the Hualapai Lodge for two nights. We all decided that this was our favorite hotel. It was possibly the nicest facility we stayed at during our trip. They have a really good continental breakfast. If you want to upgrade to a hot breakfast it's only $5 more...but what they had available at the the continental breakfast was just fine. They had donuts, muffins, bagels, fruit, yogurt, cereal, sausage or bacon with egg english muffin, and etc. Very fulfilling.

Monday we got all ready and geared up for our whitewater rafting trip through Hualapai Tourism. We were on the rapids most of the day. It was SOOOO much fun!! Our guide, Kesley, was really great. He has been driving a raft for 10 years. He said we would be rafting about 40 miles on the Colorado River!! Good thing we didn't have to paddle...we were in a 12 foot motored raft! =) 

Brendon brought his gopro and his contour cameras (with waterproof cases for both)....Brendon kept one in his raft and Branson had one in our raft. Once we have some videos edited, I'll post them, because they are pretty awesome!!!

We drove almost three hours on a school bus on a dirt road to get to the spot that we needed to start our white water rafting trip.

 The bus, the people, the rafts, the water, the view. =)

  Getting ready! So exciting!!!!

Don't let this calm setting deceive you. =)

 In my raft we had my sister, Shirl, & her daughter, Jaimee, my sister, Sherri Lin, & her daughter, Darian, my mom, my husband, & I. This rapid (pictured above) was a category 4 rapid...my mom, me, & Darian fell into the boat. Apparently, the Grand Canyon's rapid's scale goes up to 10...the highest rapid we went through during our trip was a 7. Most other white water rapids use a scale of 1 through 5. Check out: Western River, they give a pretty good explanation of the rapids and their ratings.

 We're still alive! =) And very wet! Behind us to the right you can see my other family's raft. It had my brother, Chip, with his wife and kids and my sister, Martha.

We took a little break from the rapids and hiked up to see a beautiful waterfall in a cave. My almost 67 year old mother hiked up to see it! We even had to repel back down!! She is amazing! =)

This is someone else's video of their white water experience...you'll want to mute the music, because it's pretty annoying, but if you fast forward to 1:21 you'll see what we hiked up to get to the waterfall.

 My sister, Martha & niece Darian in the waterfall.

 After our guides let us catch our breath a little bit, we were back to the rapids again.

 This is the category 7 rapid we went through! Four of us fell into the boat...glad we didn't fall out!!

This is a video that the Hualapai workers put up. This is footage of our trip. There were 5 or 6 rafts in our group. Two of them were just our family. You can hear us screaming...it's hilarious! =)

 The water was about 45 degrees. It just took your breath away...as you can see it was just smacking us right in the face!

 Someone from our group is taking off!

Waiting for our helicopter...it was pretty hot here. What they did before you got on the helicopter was weighted you while you held all of your belongings to make sure the people riding in your helicopter would still stay within the weight restrictions of the helicopter.

 The cockpit. Branson & I sat in the back with Sherri Lin & Darian. Shirl & Jaimee got to sit in the front. So there was 7 of us (including the pilot) all together in the helicopter. We took about a 15 minute ride to the top of the Grand Canyon. It seemed a lot shorter though. It was neat to see the canyon from that angle.

Exiting from our helicopter....once we were all together again we would take a 10-15 minute bus ride over to the Skywalk. 

 Tashia & Brendon are exiting from their helicopter.

 The Grand Canyon Skywalk is pretty amazing. It's a glass sidewalk 4,000 feet above the Colorado River overlooking the canyon. It's pretty intimidating, but really cool all the same. Behind us to the right is a rock formation called Eagle Point, because it looks like an eagle spreading its wings.

This video gives you a good idea what it looks like.

We weren't allowed to bring any personal items at all. They have complimentary lockers that you have to put everything in. You go through a metal detector and then your on your way to see the Skywalk. Once we got up there we had to put little booties over our shoes. We even got our own photographer. The only downside was that we had to pay $30 a picture! I thought that was a bit steep. They did have a package deal for $100 you get ALL the pictures the photographers take of you/your group on a flash drive (digital form) & you get 4 printed photos. Branson kicks himself now for not just getting the package deal that way we would have had all the individual families as well as the big family pictures. Oh, well...too late now.

After we were finished on the Skywalk we went outside to where they have an outdoor theater with really good accoustics...a Native American family was dressed in their traditional attire and was singing and dancing Native American songs. It was very interesting. Really cool to see. The father mentioned that his 16 year old son competes at powwows and wins the dancing and singing competitions. It was a pretty long drive back to the Hualapai Lodge. I think it took about 4 hours? We were all starving by the time we got back, good thing was the lodge had a restaurant that was still opened. My dad didn't go on the rafting trip with us so we sat around the dinner table telling him our stories. Later we went back to Brendon's room and crowded around his computer so we could see the videos that were taken that day.

If you want to set up a trip to the Grand Canyon, I highly recommend using Hualapai Tourism. 

They have much more to offer then just what we did. So check them out.

Hualapai Tourism

928-769-2636

www.hualapaitourism.com

Hualapai Lodge

900 Route 66

Peach Springs, Arizona

928-769-2230

Have fun! =)