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| Tuesday, November 26, 1996 Grand Canyon East Rim | |
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We spent some time walking about Grand Canyon Village.
El Tovar Hotel is magnificent; Judy and I want to come back sometime and stay there. It was built in 1905, and is full of dark heavy beams and incredible oil paintings of the canyon. Bright Angel Lodge was designed by Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter in 1935. It's got a wonderful huge fireplace in the lobby area. I wandered over near some of the attached rooms, and they looked wonderful -- completely pine-paneled and rustic. There are also individual cabins, some of them from the earliest days of the National Park at the canyon, that are also for rent. We ate breakfast at the Bright Angel both mornings. The Hopi House is a wonderful arts and crafts shop. Hopi House was also designed by Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter in 1905, designated a National Historic Landmark in 1987, and underwent major renovations (securing the floors to the walls, replacing the roof, but retaining all of the original architectural and design elements) in 1995. It's a recreation of Hopi dwellings found in and around Oraibi, Arizona, and was constructed by Hopi workmen using native stone and wood. It was the first curio shop in the Grand Canyon Park, and modeled after an actual Hopi dwelling found near Oraibi, Arizona. | |
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In the afternoon, we drove the 46-mile East Rim drive. We stopped off at Yavapai Observation Point, Yaki Point, Grandview Point, and Moran Point. Tusayan Museum is located near some twelfth century Anasazi ruins, and displays several Anasazi artifacts. Then, it was on to Desert View. |
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At the end of the East Rim drive is the fantastic Watchtower at Desert View. This was again designed by Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter in 1932, who was also the architect behind the Hopi House, Bright Angel Lodge, Phantom Ranch at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, and other park structures. Ms. Colter joins my list of female heroines -- pretty incredible for a female architect in the early 1900s. I'm interested in learning more about Colter, so if you have information, please pass it along! |
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The interior of the Watchtower is covered with wonderful Anasazi-inspired drawings. |
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There are four levels to the watchtower, all accessed by spiral staircases decorated with more drawings. |
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Yet more drawings inside the Watchtower. |
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This is a view from the third level looking down at the lower level. You can see some of the irregularly-sized and -placed windows that are all over the Watchtower. |
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| The ceiling was festooned with the most colorful drawings of all. | |
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| A Hopi woman was making a rug in the bottom floor of the Watchtower, next to a roaring cedar fire. Her rug making created this wonderful soft clicking sound every time she pressed the threads down into her loom that was quite relaxing. She had a wonderful face. | |
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| The "Desert View" from the Watchtower, showing the Colorado River and allegedly parts of the Painted Desert (although it all looks wondrous and painted to me). | |
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| We found a decent snow patch and let the kids play in it a bit. Eric thought it was swell. We didn't realize we were going to see LOTS of snow soon or we wouldn't have had them scuffling in this mud pit! | |
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You know you're getting old when you look at kids and start saying "why, in MY day, we..." Here are the kids glued in front of the TV in the Kachina Lodge room; I think this was one of their high points of the trip as well, getting to watch television! |
