The wind rose during the night and once again we woke up with a light coating of sand. Fortunately it was not too windy to cook a gourmet breakfast. We used our MSR Windpro II stove, MSR Pocket Rocket and BioLite grill to simultaneously cook scrambled eggs, boil water, and grill sausages.
We hiked up Cottonwood Canyon Road to Marble Canyon turn off and enjoyed lunch in Marble Canyon. We did not explore as far up the canyon as we would like so we will need to return another time.
I have always wanted to see a live desert tarantula in the wild and today we saw one strolling up the canyon. Yay, I can cross that off of my bucket list. Although we did once lure a mother and baby tarantula out of their nest one night in the Peruvian Amazon, this sighting was what I dreamed of as a child exploring the desert with my mother.
It was a four mile walk in soft gravel back to our campsite at dusk. We cooked dinner by headlamp and enjoyed a BioLite “campfire”.
