Not Until My 90's -- A Long-Delayed Walk On The West Side

  Our Hike To The Grand Canyon's West Exit

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A splendid, sunny Saturday, October 18, 2025.

Hiking with me, fellow lovers of the Grand Canyon and my essential support, Mrill Ingram (relation) and Missy Rigg (both hiking companions over decades). 

Our goal: the spot on the south (left) bank of the Colorado River where 1) the topographic western ending of the Grand Canyon is defined; 2) River Mile 277 is now located; 3) the Grand Canyon National Park boundary crosses the River; 4) there is a handsome landmark butte composed of the last outcrops of Canyon rocks: A pyramid of Muav limestone on top of a base of Bright Angel layers.

Just upstream from Pearce Ferry river trip take-out, this butte is a natural to be recognized, preferably with a name from the Southern Paiute, something like She Says So Long, or Come Back, or You Go We Stand...

We started by parking at the river trip take-out lot, and hiking east.

We tried to stay near the river at first. However, the silt flats between the river and the red line (our return route) have been colonized by tamarisk, so the open spaces between the live ones are usually covered by the long branches of those dead and fallen. My and the Canyon's friend, Tom Martin (of River Runners for Wilderness), says theres a trail through the wilds of tamarisk and little pits of eroded silt, but not for me this day.

We couldnt get down to the river in this stretch, either. So we wound our way among the tamarisk; the land flat, but still a treacherous footing. Nicer if it had all been like this:

The sun in front of us, the western ridges of the Canyon were still dark-shadowed.

We did not forget, even in this most empyrean of canyons, that we were hiking on No Kings Day (Mrill, me, Missy):                        

By the way, walking back, I was content to be a follower, and up along the red line on the map above shows where the tamarisk runs out as the southern ridges (that climbing south become the Grand Wash Cliffs) come down into the silt flats.

After bashing along I arrived to sit facing Riverward, staying for a while on the 277-mile, Park, boundary, contemplating Her Who Stands Tall, thinking of this goal achieved after some years.

And moving my view, as the sun had also moved, I saw it bringing full illumination on the West-end cliffs to the east of me. I realized I was getting an unlooked-for revelation about those cliffs:

But wait, let me give the reader the high-flying googlemap view of those cliffs and whats above and behind them: 

I am standing at 3. 1 is between the Westernmost High Point (Chuarumpeak Point*, or the dragonhead) and Dry Canyon running down to the Colorado at River Mile 265. 2 sits on the Sanup Plateau rim just above the pictured cliffs. South of the river, the Hualapai lands are on the right, the Park on the left. The east-west upper green line is the Park boundary, crossing the river above 3.

*A digression, but here is Dellenbaugh (1908, 250) on why this is a Paiute name worthy of recognition: Dependent on Paiute guides to get him across the Strip, on one trip the Major (John Wesley Powell) came accompanied by several Pai Ute, among whom was Chuarooumpeak, the young chief of the Kaibab...a remarkably good man, constantly devoted to (people's) safety and welfare. A most fluent speaker, he would address his people with long flights of uninterrupted rhetorical skill.

Unseen from 3, on the map above the Sanup Plateau spreads beyond 2, 3600' above the river, mostly draining north on this near-flat stretch putting the Grand Canyon drainage itself very nearly along the rim above the unnamed little canyons west of Dry and, turning north, the cliffs and jumble that descend from rim to river.

What we do see from 3, and impressive it was in full sun, I call the Sanup Escarpment, here in up-close from-above view:

This geologic map (a piece of the magnificent work of George Billingsley and Peter Huntoon. 1981) shows clearly the edge at 2 where the Sanup drops precipitately 3500' (but that is not of course to the bottom of the inner gorge now buried by Lake Mead silt), continuing north in curves, a saddle, and the small platform, Esplanade Sandstone. 

They can be picked out in the photos, although 

with all its ins and outs, then its sharp drop into a jumble of 3 drainages to the river, the escarpment is hard to take in as a single sweep of cliff, yet it is the final Grand Canyon drop to the current water level.

Reaching the 277 mile point, the Park boundary, and the last and friendly farewell butte, I had reached a limit. Mrill and Missy went on around the corner, upriver a bit.