Desert View - Day 28 - Adapting to the cold

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5:44 am - Friday - December 8th - Grand Canyon - 17º F, humidity 40%, wind  - CALM.....forecast is clear skies with a high of 49º F.  In spite of the very low morning temps we have not had our water line freeze again.

It was nice to wake up to the sun once again!  I was up about 7:20, and enjoyed the front salon by myself until well after 8 am....wish I could sleep in like TLE.  Even at that time the temps had not made it into the 30's yet.  By the time I went outside just after 10 am the sun was shinning into our site nicely, and in spite of the temps being in the mid 30's was able to stand in the windless sunshine feeling quite comfortable.  My purpose for being outside in that temperature was to dump our black tank as it had been about 8 days since the last dump.  All went well until I went to hookup the hose I use to flush the black tank to the hose bib on the passenger side of the coach.....apparently I had left too much water in the hose when I disconnected it the previous time and it was now full of ice, and no water would flow through it......hmmmm.  The only choice was to disconnect it from both sides and lay it in the sun until it thawed out enough to force the ice out under pressure.  Within about 20 minutes I was able to flush the ice out, and get back to flushing our black tank.  That took just a few minutes, and I was finally able to go back inside the coach and get warm again.  This time when I turned the water off I made sure all the water was drained out of the flushing hose to avoid a repeat performance.

Even though the daytime high temperature was only supposed to get to 38º F, we had planned to take a hike sometime in the afternoon down the old fire road I rode my MTB on last week.  By 2 pm it seemed it would get no warmer than the 37º F at the time so we set off on our hike.  We planned to hike just 50 minutes down the trail which I figured would amount to about 2 miles down and then 2 miles back up the hill......the skies were crystal clear and you could see a long, long way........

.....after about 25 minutes of hiking (about 1 mile) we came to a place where we could see into the Grand Canyon, and also caught a view of the Watchtower (see two pictures just above)......by the time we hit our 50 minute mark we had covered exactly 2 miles.  I forgot to turn on my Strava program at the beginning, but had it on for the return hike back to the Newell.....apparently we dropped 633' in elevation to our turn around point.  The hike back confirmed the two mile distance, and showed we had gained 633' in elevation by the time we reached the Newell.  In all we hiked 4 miles (I'm doubling the one way distance), and burned somewhere just over 700 caloric units, and our one way moving time was 45 minutes and 40 seconds.....just under 3 mph for the return hike.......

......we were home by 3:40 pm.....while we were a little cold going downhill, the hike back up the hill warmed us up completely and there was no immediate rush to get back inside the Newell......within a few minutes after we did go back inside I looked out the window to see 4 mule deer foraging right next to our picnic table.  You can tell mule deer by their long mule like ears......

......while there are a lot of mule deer in this area, this is the first time I have seen them in our site.

We watched the news for the first time in quite a while to see what was happening with the possible government shutdown and found out quickly that a 'Continuing Resolution' had been passed by both houses of congress extending the deadline to come up with a budget until December 22nd, so we will be working at least two more weeks before the next deadline.

By 5 pm it was getting quite cold again outside, and I was grateful I would be sleeping inside and not outside with the mule deer.  Since I had the 'open' shift Friday I was in bed just before 10 pm, and slept like a baby all night.

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