Grand Canyon Hiking Common Sense

Rajen Jani, Yahoo! Contributor Network
Feb 28, 2007 "Share your voice on Yahoo! websites. Start Here."

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Falls. Falling, tripping, slipping, while climbing or walking causes many bruises, and injuries to the bone. This should be avoided by taking sufficient rest at regular intervals. Take a walking stick if required.
Eating. Eat at least twice the amount than you normally do. Eat small quantities of complex carbohydrates like fruits, breads, crackers, and grains, throughout the day every half an hour. Insufficient food intake will burn up fat, muscle tissue and in the heat will make you ill. Eating is your best defense against hyponatremia, and hypothermia.
Hyponatremia or water intoxication. Do not only drink water instead of eating. This can develop into hyponatremia or water intoxication, which leads to seizures and death. You must do both, eat solid food and drink water.
Dehydration. If you drink less amount of water, then your body becomes dehydrated and you cannot continue with your hiking. You must drink before you feel thirsty. If you feel thirsty, then your body has already become dehydrated.
Hypothermia. When the body heat falls less than required to maintain proper functioning of the vital organs, the body cools to unacceptable levels resulting in a serious medical condition known as hypothermia. Drinking very cold water from streams, rivers, letting wet clothes dry by themselves while on the body, or facing very cold winds without proper clothing can all take away the body heat. Hypothermia patients, as canyoneers put it, "mumble, grumble, fumble, stumble, and tumble". Treatment should be getting dry and out of the wind. Recovery from hypothermia may be with a dry fleece jacket, a cap, a blanket, hard candy in the mouth, with the body not standing, but sleeping horizontally, and a warm cup of tea. A campfire would add more heat to the surrounding making recovery faster. The head mainly loses body heat; hence wearing proper headgear is important.
When climbing uphill, wait for the shade. Your body will overheat if you hike uphill in direct sunshine. You will sweat twice more and lose a lot of energy. You should wait till the shade hits the trail and then start hiking uphill. This will not only make a pleasant journey hiking out of the canyon but you can also reach base before it gets dark. Flashlights are essential (available for sale at Phantom Ranch) if you are a slow hiker. If you must hike in the sunshine, then soak your clothes with water and let they dry on your body while hiking in the sunshine. This will reduce body heat from being lost, and you will not sweat excessively. In winter, use synthetic fabrics or natural fabrics like wool and silk, even if they are warm. Cotton should be avoided in winter as it takes away body heat by evaporation and conduction. Cotton also takes a long time to dry and should be avoided in winter.
Rest periodically putting your legs up. Every hour take a ten minute break to rest and put your legs up the level of your heart and let gravity help drain the metabolic waste products out of your legs. In the end, breaks do not slow you down, and also recharge your energy levels.
Walk normally. Do not huff and puff. If you can talk while you walk, then you are walking at the perfect speed. Huffing and puffing will make you sick.
Know your limits. Know your body limits and act accordingly. Do not hike to the river and back in one day. It is harder than running a marathon in the heat. Limit your activities as per your body requirements. Do not overstrain.
Stay together. Staying together helps in more ways than you can imagine. Hike early mornings, rest in the afternoon, and hike again early evening, rest in night and you will enjoy your Grand Canyon hiking.
Sources:
http://www.nps.gov/grca/
http://www.kaibab.org/bc/suffer.htm
http://www.grand.canyon.national-park.com/hike.htm