RE: Grand Canyon

[Kelly]

 
[font=" comic sans ms" ]We are planning a trip to the Grand Canyon this year....
 We are trying to decide where to stay.  Have heard that we should avoid the South Rim during peak season and visit the North Rim instead.  Since we are coming from the north this makes a lot of sense to me.  We could probably spend some time in Arches or Canyonland NPs in UT or Mesa Verde in CO if we stayed to the north. Very tempting.  
 Anybody have any thoughts on this?  Would we be missing a LOT if we stayed to the north?
 
 Thanks in Advance![/font]

[kitphantom]

 Kelly
Visiting the South Rim in high season can mean waiting in lines to ride the shuttles. Zion s shuttle system works very well, so far our experience is that Grand Canyon s needs a lot of fine tuning.  If you are planning to camp at the CG itself, you ll need reservations for the North Rim (& more than likely for the ones at South Rim).  It does not open until the end of May, usually.  There are CG s on the road to the North Rim, but we did not check them out the time we went.  Arches & Canyonlands are areas we have returned to more than once, and they are still on the " do again"  list.  Again, the area has been " discovered" , so finding a campsite can require great timing, unless you have reservations (not all public CGs take reservations).
 When are you planning on visiting?  Anything past mid-May seems to be pretty busy.  2 years ago we took a " ladies-only"  trip at the beginning of June to Canyonlands/Arches (we camped at Dead Horse Point SP, since we could make reservations & have never yet stayed at a private CG) plus some other areas in Utah.  It got a bit hot for much activity by early afternoon, but we were tied into the school schedule.  (Since DH & I have no children, we tend to camp more off season.)  We still had a great trip.