ARIZONA'S HIGHS AND LOWS

TOP to BOTTOM

Hiking the Depths of the Grand Canyon For some reason, my husband took exception to the hissing sounds I made as we stumbled up the Grand Canyon's Bright Angel Trail under the darkness of night. I pretended I was trying to scare away lurking rattlesnakes, but apparently my imitation was a little too good. We were trekking from the bottom of the Grand Canyon to the top of the San Francisco Peaks, sampling the great extremes of environment Arizona offers: a more than 10,000-foot elevation change, from canyon to mountaintop, desert to tundra, temperatures from 100 degrees to near freezing.

We laid our plans precisely. To avoid the summer heat in the Canyon, we were going to hike out by full moon. With Flagstaff friends Tod and Becky Lewis, we went down the South Kaibab Trail, camped at Bright Angel Campground and spent the following day reading, sipping lemonade at Phantom Ranch and dangling our toes in the chilly Bright Angel Creek.

At 4 P.M., the thermometer in the campground still registered 95 degrees, but we knew the worst of the heat was over. We loadedour packs, crossed the Colorado River on the bridge and headed over the sandy trail high above the water. At the rest house at the foot of the Bright Angel Trail, we stopped for dinner. No five-star restaurant in the world could match the view from the patio there, where we dined on chicken and noodles. We lingered by the river as cool shadows crept over the swirling waters, one of those peak moments in the Canyon of complete and utter con-tentment, the power of the Canyon pulling. But our campsite at Indian Garden was calling, too, so we started up the trail, hop-ping rocks across the gentle, gurgling waters of Pipe Creek and trudging up a set of steep switchbacks called the Devil's Corkscrewthrough the Vishnu schist, dark as forged iron and ribboned with pink granite. One of the unexpected pleasures of this dusk exit was having the Canyon to our-selves. Sunset light gilded the high cliffs with gold. A waterfall spilled over a lip of rock, shimmering with emerald ferns. A basso symphony of croaking frogs enter-tained us. Just as we topped out on the schist, we watched, enthralled, as the full moon slid over a butte and shed its marble light across the Canyon.

We lingered by the river as cool shadows crept over the swirling waters, one of those peak moments in the Canyon.

Our plan suffered from one flaw: We failed to consider that the light of the moon would not reach the narrows of the sandstone canyon that leads into Indian Garden. We turned a corner and suddenly it was pitch black, the corrugated trail a pitfall of hills and swales. Our small headlamps provided little assistance. We slowed, stayed close together, concentrated on every tentative step and warned one another of potential ankle-bending holes. And, of course, we stayed especially alert for snakes, which could put a damper on the romance of the evening. Finally, we dragged into camp, fumbled with the tent and, at last, crawled into our sleeping bags.

Despite the challenges, personal experience and hindsight reinforced the decision to hike out at night. The only real solution to the rigors of summer in this desert is to avoid moving about at midday. Some opt to start hiking at first light and be past the most brutal uphill sections before the mercury hits redline. Then they play lizard, hunkering down in any small patch of shade, taking it easy until late afternoon, then walking out. Or, waiting for the full moon.

Along the main Canyon corridor, the Bright Angel Trail remains the preferred route for hiking out. The alternative South Kaibab Trail offers a waterless, steep 7-mile grind. Bright Angel Trail, on the other hand, (PRECEDING PANEL, PAGES 38 AND 39) Helen Fairley and Ed Peacock hike near the frozen "top" of the state, en route to the summit of Humphreys Peak. (OPPOSITE PAGE) Bright Angel Creek near Phantom Ranch in the depths of the Grand Canyon constitutes the "bottom" of Arizona. (LEFT) Mules make their way down Bright Angel Trail toward the Canyon floor. (ABOVE) Tod Lewis protects himself from the midday summer heat at Phantom Ranch.

follows a stream part of the way, and water is piped into the two rest houses on the upper portion. Still, it's 9 miles, uphill all the way, from an elevation of 2,400 feet at the river to 6,800 feet on the South Rim.

People often underestimate the rigors of a Grand Canyon hike. They cruise blithely down the trail, and only begin to appreciate the toll it took when they must turn around and hike back out. Once, in the ranger's office at Phantom Ranch, I witnessed a woman in tears, vowing she could not possibly make the hike back up and begging for a mule to haul her out. The ranger, who had obviously seen this kind of raw emotion before, applied moleskin to her blisters and handed her a big bag of tennis shoes, advising her to find a pair that fit.

Sometimes the stories don't end so easily. Each summer, the National Park Service responds to hundreds of heat-related emergencies. A few people die. To avoid such tragedies, the Park Service launched a campaign to alert Canyon walkers to the dangers of exertion in the heat. Signs at all trailheads urge hikers to carry at least a gallon of water per person per day in summer.

We took all the precautions we could, including spending two days to make the hike out. After a short night's sleep at Indian Garden, we rose early, swigged a cup of coffee and started up the long ramp of trail out. With blackberries ripening and birdsong filling the air, it would have been pleasant to linger, but wisdom dictated we take advantage of the mild morning.

An Australian man, a sheep shearer, soon joined our group. By a stroke of luck, he'd snared a spur-of-the-moment hiking permit and seemed for a while not to mind our slow pace.

After about a mile we reached the base of the Redwall, a stunning barrier of limestone cliffs halfway up the canyon, carved into magnificent amphitheaters. On any Grand Canyon hike, the individual layers of rock make the best markers of progress. As we lugged past each one, we clicked through their names like a mantra Tapeats, Bright Angel, Muav, Redwall, Supai, Hermit, Coconino moving forward in time millions of years with each layer. At the Three-Mile Resthouse, we shrugged off our packs, refueled with Gatorade and gorp and talked to a woman who had brought her 11-year-old grandson from Pennsylvania to hike the Canyon. Both professed to having the time of their lives.

Far from a wilderness experience, the Bright Angel Trail sees a parade of muleriders and day-hikers. They streamed past us, skipping and smiling happily on their way down, their T-shirts still crisp and white. They eyed us with a mixture of sympathy and concern for our sweaty uphill labor.

We plodded on, the trail seeming to grow ever steeper, the Rim receding instead of getting closer. Tod stayed behind me, which kept me moving. "Are we there yet?" I whined. When I turned around and saw where we'd been, I realized we had to be nearing our goal. Spotting the tunnels bored into the Kaibab limestone near the top, we knew we'd made it. We topped out on the Rim, big smiles on our faces. Finishing a Grand Canyon hike always elicits a sense of triumph and satisfaction; I've seen tough old guys break into tears at the end of the trail.

But at the South Rim, we stood only halfway from the bottom of the Canyon to the "top" of Arizona. Our next challenge loomed on the southern horizon the San Francisco Peaks, which preside over Flagstaff.

On Fourth of July weekend, we strapped on the packs again, this time joined byour friends Helen Fairley and Ed Peacock. The most popular route to the summit is the Humphreys Trail, a strenuous 4.5 miles one way. The trail leaves the Arizona Snowbowl parking lot at 9,600 feet and tops out on Humphreys Peak at 12,643 feet, the highest point in the state.

Instead of thinking about the rarefied air at this altitude, I focused on the flowers of summer decorating the edge of the trail - fat and happy lupines, scarlet-red paintbrush, wild geraniums, Rocky Mountain irises, drooping bluebells, golden columbines and dainty Canada violets. In a few spots, Parry primroses bloomed, gaudy fuchsia-colored flowers with luxurious green leaves. Swallowtail butterflies fluttered from blossom to blossom like windblown leaves.

Unlike the hard, dusty trails of the Grand Canyon, this one felt soft underfoot, cushioned by evergreen needles. We walked through a thick verdant forest of quaking aspen, Englemann spruce and corkbark fir trees. Clumps of bracken fern grew kneehigh. A hermit thrush filled the misty woods with song, like a sweet silver bell. A mocking, raucous Clark's nutcracker squawked at trespassers.

As the trail climbs ever higher, the trees start to show the effects of altitude, and near the timberline just a few wind-whipped bristlecone pines hug the rocky ground. Above the timberline lies true alpine tundra, the rockfields tufted with delicate miniature flowers including avens and moss campion. This is the only place where this treeless habitat exists in the entire state.

Serious clouds were coalescing around the mountain as if it were a magnet. The monsoon season started right on schedule. Dayhikers wafted into the saddle like the clouds, pausing to gaze into the Inner Basin, a big bowl that collapsed in the explosion that created