Grand Canyon is a labyrinth of side canyons, side-side canyons, intricate ridges, and mountains. Many of Grand Canyons peaks rise more than a mile above their bases and would be impressive mountains on their own. From the rims, most of Grand Canyon's summits are lost in the immensity. But from below, the Grand Canyon appears to be a mountain range - an upside down one.

Although some of the canyons summits are technical (class 4 or harder), most are class 3 or easier. The difficult part of the ascent is not the climb, but in getting to the start. Grand Canyon has very few trails. The Bright Angel Trail and transcanyon Kaibab Trail are the only maintained trails below the rim. Another dozen or so old prospector trails are maintained primarily by hiker use. That leaves around 90 percent of the canyon's backcountry accessible only by cross-country hiking.

Some of the buttes, mesas, temples, and shrines can be reached by day trips off the south or north rims, and others can be reached from a river camp. Others are so remote that they can only be reached by an extended backpack trip. Scarcity of water and persistent cliff bands, some more than 500 feet high, make such extended trips difficult. Before undertaking a cross-country backpack trip, hikers should have experience on most of the old trails in the canyon and be competent at reading 7.5-minute USGS topographic maps, the only maps in print that have enough detail and accuracy. Serious trip planning is required in order to locate water sources and plan a route that will get you through the cliff bands. Study of the books and maps by the three main authorities on cross-country hiking, Harvey Butchart, George Steck and Tom Martin is essential.

Part of the attraction of climbing Grand Canyon's summits is that they were so late in being climbed, at least by those who recorded their exploits. Undoubtedly, the natives who lived in and around the canyon for thousands of years climbed most of the summits, but they left no record of their ascents other than artifacts. By 1912, only three summits had recorded ascents; The Battleship, Coronado Butte and Mount Huethawali, all easily accessible from trails just off the South Rim. The Canyon's first real mountaineer was Merrel Clubb, who first saw the canyon in 1939 and soon became an enthusiastic peak bagger. By the time he made the first ascent of Vishnu Temple in 1946, he had reached several other summits.

Vishnu Temple, whose sharp summit is often compared to the Matterhorn in Switzerland, is arguably the canyon's most visible and dramatic summit. Although the standard route is 4th class - easy by modern climbing standards - it is hard to reach. The shortest route involves an arduous two- or three-day hike from the North Rim. When three of us climbed Vishnu in 1990, it was still only the 14th ascent.

Another serious peak bagger appeared on the scene in the 1950s: Harvey Butchart, who met Merrel Clubb on the North Rim in 1957. Fired up by Merrel's tales of climbs in the canyon, Harvey started bagging peaks himself, and soon surpassed Merrel's tally. By the time Harvey stopped climbing in the 1980s, he had climbed 83 of the 140 named summits, more than 60 of which were first ascents. Although none of his routes was harder than 4th class, technical rock climbers who have made much harder 5th-class ascents in the canyon, stand in awe of Harvey's accomplishments. Many of Harvey's climbs are terrifically exposed and extremely bold to do without a rope and climbing gear.

The first technical ascent in Grand Canyon was the climb of Zoroaster Temple by Dave Ganci and Rick Tidrick in 1958. Others soon followed, including the sheer Mount Sinyala and the aptly named, graceful spires of Angels Gate. Only a small number of rock climbers thought the climbing on the canyon's soft and crumbly sandstones and limestones was worth the long and arduous approach hikes. I was lucky enough to be involved in some of the last first ascents in the canyon, including Buddha Temple, Holy Grail Temple, Kwagunt Butte, and Malgosa Crest. As an example of the effort required by these climbs, our climb of Kwagunt Butte in 1980 required a two-day approach carrying 60-lbs. packs, and we spent six days working out the route and carrying water up to our base camp. By the 1980s, nearly all of Grand Canyon summits had been climbed and an era had come to a close.

Still, there are a few peak baggers out there who are enamored of Grand Canyon's summits. Thus, Jim, Art, and I are all Canyon peak baggers of various levels of enthusiasm. Jim wants to climb as many of the named summits as possible, I'm mainly interested in the more prominent peaks, and Art falls somewhere in between. The goal of our planned 12-day spring hike was to climb 13 of the least-accessible summits in the far eastern section of Grand Canyon. It was an ambitious plan which immediately had to be modified to suit conditions - being flexible is a lesson the Grand Canyon mountaineer learns early on. Since these peaks all lie between the North Rim and the Colorado River, and the North Rim is snowed in until mid-May (by which time it's far too hot to hike in the canyon), the only access to this area other than the river is via the Nankoweap Trail.

Then, a last-minute snowstorm hit, making the drive up from Phoenix treacherous for Art and Jim (there was a 120-car pileup on the interstate near Flagstaff a couple of days before). We opted to start a day late and make it an 11-day trip, which ended up costing us some summits. We'd already shuttled a car to our exit trail head on the South Rim. On the first day of the trip, a friend dropped us off at the remote Saddle Mountain Trailhead. Because of lingering winter snow on the north fork of the Saddle Mountain Trail that made the Nankoweap Trail inaccessible, we used the east fork of Saddle Mountain Trail and a cross-country descent into Little Nankoweap Canyon. After an easy hike on the trail, we found ourselves at the rim looking for the route down. Most cross-country descents into Grand Canyon look terrifyingly steep from above, and this one was no exception, but a cairn pointed the way so we started down a steep ravine. A small down-climb required us to pass packs, but the rest of the descent was straightforward through the 200-foot cliffs of Kaibab limestone, and the next obstacle, the 400-foot thick Coconino sandstone. We were able to connect ledges with a few down climbs and came out onto a broad terrace in the red Supai formation. Below us, the way was clear to intercept a route we'd used five years previously. The setting sun and a few rain pockets from the recent storm enticed us to make camp on the sandstone ledges.

Next morning, we joined our old route and followed a river runner's trail down through the canyon's most serious obstacle, the 550-foot-thick Redwall limestone. This formation is made up of pure, hard gray limestone and forms a persistent cliff throughout the length of the canyon. Rarely, routes follow faults and rock slides through the Redwall, which gets its name from the fact that most exposures are stained red by minerals washing down from the red Supai formation above. We had to pass packs at one short down climb in the Redwall, but after that the river-runner trail became distinct and we rapidly descended to the bed of Little Nankoweap Canyon, where it was an easy walk down the dry bed to the river.

Since river running is extremely popular through Grand Canyon, boaters with extra time like to do side hikes. Over time, the most popular routes have developed unofficial "use trails." As backpackers, we're certainly not above taking advantage of these trails when we can.

Now we had a straightforward hike along the right bank of the river for a couple of days, which would bring us into the Lava Creek area and the first group of summits. Well, straightforward on the map, anyway. In practice, the actual banks of the river in the eastern Grand Canyon are rocky and choked with thorny brush. For most of the second day, we were able to follow river-runner and deer trails along the slopes above the brush line, and toward the end of the day the Tapeats sandstone appeared at river levels with some excellent ledge walking. We camped right next to the river on some fine, flat sandstone slabs.

We made rapid progress on the third day, until we passed the confluence with the Little Colorado River. Here, the 200-foot-thick Tapeats sandstone begins to form a cliff which drops sheer into the river, so we had to make our way along the terrace at the top of the cliff. The going turned out to be rougher than we expected, and the sun was on the horizon when we reached Carbon Creek. From above and in the fading light, we couldn't find a suppose route to the river, so we followed the rim of Carbon Canyon west to the Butte Fault. Here, a massive displacement has lifted the rock layers on the west 2,500 feet higher than the same rocks on the east, creating a fault line of shattered rocks that crosses the eastern Grand Canyon from south to north. At the fault, we were able to descend to Carbon Creek and camp in the last light of the day. Because of the wet winter, Carbon Creek had water at the fault.

The fourth day was supposed to be our first summit day. We hiked up the dry West Fork of Carbon Creek and crossed a low pass to Chuar Creek, where we expected to find water for a base camp. But Chuar was dry, so we had to walk a mile down Chuar Creek to Lava Creek, which has a permanent flow. Then we had to retrace our steps up Chuar Creek to start the 10-mile round trip to Cochise Butte and Gunther Castle. We just plain ran out of gas a couple of miles short of the summits, probably because we'd just had three days of hard hiking. We returned to Lava Creek for a good night's sleep.

In the morning, Jim and Art set off for Cochise and Gunther, but I decided to make an easy day of it exploring up Lava Creek. High water meant I had to wade most of the way, but I located a small Anasazi ruin and checked out a break in the Tapeats and Redwall cliffs that would be useful for climbing Juno and Jupiter Temples. Jim and Art were able to bag both Cochise and Gunther in a very long day of hiking and scrambling.

Our original plan had been to continue up Lava Creek and go over the saddle between Juno Temple and Cape Final (on the North Rim), but since we'd lost a day at the start of the trip and another because of yesterdays burnout, we decided to blow off Juno, Jupiter, and a third butte in the area, and climb directly south out of camp to a break we could see in the Tapeats sandstone (now high above us once again because of the displacement along the Butte Fault). Above the Tapeats break we contoured south, and then ascended an easy ravine through the Redwall limestone to the saddle between Venus and Apollo Temples. On the way up, we spotted an unmapped natural arch in the Redwall rim north of Apollo Temple. Easy scrambles without our big packs got us to the top of both summits. Then we walked the Redwall rim to a point were we could look down at the arch. It took us a bit of time and map study to find the known Redwall descent east of Apollo Temple, but finally we came out on top of the Tapeats sandstone once again, on the ridge leading out to Ochoa Point, a named summit that is really just the end of a ridge in the Tapeats sandstone. We'd planned to descend to the river, but once again time was short. We had just enough water for a dry camp on the ridge with some fine views.

Hikers not familiar with desert hiking are often appalled at the idea of camping away from water, but learning the technique opens up many possibilities, even in well-watered country. In the Grand Canyon, dry camping is an essential skill because it's often a couple of days between reliable water sources. The trick is to carry foods that don't require excess water to cook, and to avoid all non-essential water use. Collapsible water bags hold a lot of water and take up no room in your pack when empty.

The descent to the river was rough and took some route finding, and we reached the river at noon. After a nice, long lunch in the shade of a cliff, we walked downriver past the mouth of Unkar Creek to our last camp next to the river. Downstream, the river enters 1,200-foot deep Granite Gorge, and cliffs make it impossible to hike along the river.
A couple of hours of easy, though steep, climbing on a good river-runner trail put us on top of The Tabernacle, a rounded butte in the Muav limestone. Leaving our packs at the saddle between The Tabernacle and Solomon Temple, we scrambled up Redwall limestone ledges on the east face to reach the shattered summit. We descended Solomon, picked up our packs, and climbed to the saddle north of Sheba Temple. I was starting to want some down time more than I wanted another summit, so I hung out under a shady ledge while Jim and Art climbed Sheba. By the time they returned, the wind was starting to pick up. We probably should have found a more sheltered camp than the saddle, but none of us really wanted to move. Jim and Art slept in the open on their ground sheets and pads, while I set up my solo tent.

As we packed up in the morning, the wind was gusting to 30-plus mph and was trying to snatch our gear out of our hands and blow it off the cliffs. It was a relief to start up the Redwall ravine north of camp and get some shelter from the wind. A short walk west along the Redwall rim brought us to a rock slide on the south side of Rama Shrine. Some route finding took us through small sandstone cliffs in the Supai formation and on to the summit. The views were some of the best of the trip, including the pyramid of Vishnu Temple close by to the north. We then continued on the Redwall rim around the north side of Rama, where we spotted a 30-foot natural bridge in the Redwall. More rim walking took us to the Krishna Shrine-Vishnu Temple Saddle, where Jim and Art bagged the last summit of the trip.

Late in the day, we started north down the Redwall via a steep, loose ravine, which soon ended in an impossible, high fall. But a narrow terrace on the left offered a way to continue. Usually, such traverses end in an obvious rock slide or talus slope that offers a way down, but we couldn't see anything like that up ahead. Instead, the ledge ended at an amazing slot, steep, but enclosed enough to avoid much exposure, that continued all the way to the bottom. We boulder-hopped our way a couple of miles down Vishnu Creek toward a seasonal spring, which turned out to have a fine flow of water over an expanse of flat, shale ledges. After the howling windstorm the previous night, it was wonderful to camp on rock ledges and listen to to the gentle murmur of the creek - and the frog chorus.

Now, with all the summits behind us- ten for Jim and Art, and six for me - our focus turned to getting out of this big hole in the ground. Jim and Art had worked out a short cut on a previous trip, so we were able to climb an easy ravine through the Redwall, traverse the Redwall rim for a couple of miles, and then descend directly into the northeast arm of Clear Creek with half the distance and effort of the usual route on the Tapeats sandstone rim. The 3rd-class Redwall descent below Angels Gate was intricate and a bit exposed in places - my sixth new Redwall route of the trip.

But from here it was a cruise. After a well-deserved washing up, we followed the beautiful creek downstream through some impressive narrows, and then walked a mile up the north fork to the foot of the Clear Creek Trail. This excellent trail was built by the Civilian Conservation Corp in the 1930s to connect the trans-canyon North Kaibab Trail to Clear Creek. We made short work of the climb up to the Tapeats sandstone rim on the well-used trail, and then zipped around past Zoroaster Canyon to a dry camp on sandstone ledges just at dark.

On day 11, we finished off the Clear Creek Trail and walked a third of a mile down the wide North Kaibab Trail to Phantom Ranch, the small resort at the confluence of Bright Angel Creek and the Colorado River. Total shock! People strolling about, a cantina with cold lemonade, a pay phone! After wallowing in these luxuries for a while, we hiked past the campground and ranger station, crossed the Silver Bridge over the Colorado River, and hiked up the Bright Angel Trail to the South Rim and our waiting car. It had been a most rewarding trip - perfect weather except for the windstorm, wild, remote country, and a bunch of new summits.

We're already planning the next one.