Williams, AZ > Grand Canyon Railway February 11, 2020

After a pretty crappy night sleep, I arrived at the train station at the requested time and loaded myself into the Coach A train car.  Turns out there are two Coach cars, one with kids and one with adults only.  Each car has an attendant that provided a lot of information about the canyon, the train, the landscape we were seeing etc.  She was very informative and very funny and kept us entertained along the way.  On both legs of the train ride, there are also musical acts and on the way home our train got robbed by three guys on horseback.  I expect the kids loved that.  I honestly thought it was a big cheesy and I kept wondering how much it cost to hire guys to drive out into the middle of no where to fake rob a train.  They have to bring horses and arrange for the horses to be returned etc.  It was weird.  I expect during the summer months when there are double or triple the amount of people on the train, it goes over a little better.

I did see some pronghorn in the field with some cows on the way back.  That was pretty cool.  People consider them antelope or deer, but it turns out they are more closely related to giraffes.

I've been to the Grand Canyon 20 years ago.  My memory is wonky of that time and the park itself has changed a lot.  I went back to the park at the end of November when I first got to the Flagstaff area but the weather was horrible and their were too many people.  The train ride was actually a great way to get back to the Park.  It allowed me to get more settled and wander about and feel more comfortable.  We had 3.5 hours in the park and that allowed me to fully explore the Village area, the shops along the way, the Southern Rim and read a lot of historical markers.  Many people also indulged in lunch at the park and I would have liked to that too, but I packed food and diet coke and I really didn't need to spend the extra.  I also used the time to review the maps as I wandered around.  I felt really disoriented when I came in November.  The people and traffic were crazy and I didn't have the patience for it.    This time, I was able to explore a section of the park and it helped break down the other sections of the park.  They have shuttle buses now, and I don't remember those being around on my first visit here.  So you don't even need a car to explore the park.  I studied the maps and made a plan for the next day, when I would drive to the park on my own.

Got back to Williams and I was really tired.  I wasn't really that hungry, but I really wanted a cocktail.  I don't drink that much on the road (no immediate access to a toilet changes things) but the beers the night before were good and I thought it might be nice to have another one.  I went to a second brewery about half a mile off Route 66 called the Grand Canyon Brewing Company.  They had Blueberry Cider and I had two.  It was good.