In the meantime, Andy went off to use the treadmill in the fitness center while I once again tackled the "what is going on with blogger on my iPad" issue.
Though of course I checked my email first - to see an urgent message from Hotels.com telling me that our hotel reservation for North Charleston, SC on August 20 was canceled because the hotel was "overbooked". Um. What? I made that reservation about a month ago with no problem - what the heck?
Let me back up a bit in case you are confused - we're flying back from Las Vegas on August 19, spending one night at home, and then on Sunday, August 20 we're going to get back into a car (this time our own) and drive to Charleston to be in place to experience totality for 1 minute 48 seconds on Monday August 21, then get back in the car and drive home. Yes, this is a little crazy, but how often does a total solar eclipse come within arms reach? or a day's drive? Andy gets credit for this idea.
Back to the story - so I had booked a hotel in North Charleston, and now the hotel has reneged on the booking. So I call Hotels.com.
I have to say, the agent on the phone was terrific - she assured me that Hotels.com guarantees the booking and she will find me something.
After an extended period of time on hold (she checked in periodically to tell me she was still looking), basically there was nothing available (surprise surprise!) unless we were willing to pay for a required 3 night booking for the one night. Time for a change in strategy.
I brought up Google maps and started looking for places further away from Charleston that might have rooms available. Our original idea was to check the weather on August 21 and start driving first thing towards a place that had a good weather forecast. So what if we were a little further away from Charleston anyway?
An already long story shorter: we got a room in a motel (Super 8?) in some place called Florence, SC. about 2 hours from Charleston and 2 1/2 hours from Greenville. The good news is that the drive on Aug 20 is now a couple of hours shorter and we are better positioned to start driving west. The drive back from Greenville (assuming that's where we end up) is about the same. That will still be miserable and I will still be marginally functional the same day.
Anyway, this wasted a good chunk of time this morning. I guess payback for Day #1 going so well.
We went down and had breakfast - the Maitre D asked us how everything was going and we told her the A/C was a problem. She said when we talked to the front desk to mention we paid for breakfast so we can get a freebie. Ok! sounds good!
So we did - the front desk sent up the maintenance guy immediately. We had noticed when we arrived yesterday that the A/C unit was unplugged from the wall - tried plugging it back in, but no luck. Turns out we had to hit the "reset" button. Not an obvious solution, but an easy one.
We're off to the Grand Canyon! With all our rain gear because of course it's going to rain! But we stop at the front desk to ask a couple of questions, not the least of which is - where is the shuttle stop? All of this takes way longer than expected, of course, but we go out to sit in front of the hotel, because the front desk had said, "the stop is right outside." When asked, "you mean under the over hang?", the reply was "yes". There we were out front under the overhang.
Except that it was the wrong overhang - the correct overhang was actually on the sidewalk by the main street, as in: an actual bus stop. But we just sat there and missed two shuttles (they run every 20 minutes!) before asking a third time. And also this little tidbit - we needed to have a park pass in order to ride the shuttle. Wow, good thing we do (I have my senior lifetime pass that I waited 10 weeks for it to arrive), but what if you didn't know that?
Anyway, hallelujah, we are on the shuttle bus and a quick 20 minutes later (with a little traffic at the park entrance) we are at the Visitor's Center! Where Andy was going to buy his own senior lifetime pass, because normally the visitor's center is where one does things like that, except of course not this time. We will need to take a separate trip to the park HQ.
The Mather viewpoint is a short walk away, though it takes me forever because 7000 feet is 7000 feet. And finally, finally, here we are, with ominous clouds hanging over us:
Seriously, it is so stunning it's just impossible to take it all in. It actually doesn't look real at all. If I didn't know better, I'd swear I was looking at some CGI generated background.
We walk along the rim trail for a bit, look at it from assorted angles and it's still incomprehensible.
Since we took so much time this morning just getting to this point, it is now lunch time. We get back on the shuttle to go back to the visitor's center, but when we get to the Yavapai viewpoint we decide to take one more look:
Even more amazing. In theory there's a little muddy puddle down there that is the mighty Colorado river, but it's really hard to see.
We get back on the shuttle just as it's starting to rain a bit, and head towards HQ so Andy can get his own senior pass.
Ok, I have mention something about the shuttle buses. The first time we got on one in front of the hotel, the driver noticed that I was going to have a hard time pulling myself up onto the big step. But it's a "kneeling" bus - he pushes a button and now it's easy-peasy onto the bus. After that, every time I got onto one of the buses I asked the driver to lower the step. Most of them were quite happy to do it.
Except this guy, the driver of the shuttle we're going to take to HQ. This guy I have to ask twice. He just looks at me until I ask a third time. Mr Customer Service punches the button like I was asking for a month of his salary.
The bus shuffles along a couple of stops - and somebody comes on board who has a walker. Mr Grumpy makes a big announcement about making sure this person has one of the handicap seats. All well and good, we get to the stop at HQ. As I make my way forward, I ask him if he could please lower the step. He looks at me and says, "Go ahead, you can get off". Once again I asked him to lower the step and he angrily punches the button (really, so much effort!). As I get off I tell him over my shoulder rather loudly that "Not everybody who has problems with steps has a walker!".
Anyway, Andy gets his very own pass. A short walk (but an eternity) away is the Market Plaza - the Park's "supermarket" and deli. Where we buy pretty awful sandwiches and sit on benches watching the on-and-off rain turn into a pretty nice day.
But at this point we're done for the day. Via assorted shuttle buses we make our way back to the hotel to pass out for a bit.
Dinner tonight was at the buffet - not the greatest, but we didn't have to go anywhere.
Day #3 - Sunrise at the Grand Canyon (i.e. I'm in a hurry to get this published so I can go to bed because we're getting up at 3:45 tomorrow morning.
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