[Leica] Re: Grand Canyon snow

[lrzeitlin at optonline.net (Lawrence Zeitlin)]

On Dec 15, 2008, at 5:01 PM, Hoppy wrote:

> Dear Steve, please contact someone in state government and have the  
> heat
> turned up for Arizona. We just got back from the Grand Canyon and  
> nearly
> froze our a**es off! I didn't even know that thermometers went down  
> below 0
> on your Fahrenheit scale!
> Cheers
> temporarily Arizonian Hoppy


I guess you didn't get down to river level. About 20 years ago we  
rafted down the Grand Canyon length of Colorado River in the middle  
of April. True to your experience, there was a couple of feet of snow  
on the rim but at river level the temperature was in the balmy 80s.  
We camped out in pop tents and went swimming in the calm pools of  
water. Apparently the sunlight gets reflected off the canyon walls  
and is concentrated at the base. Sort of like a solar collector. In  
retrospect, I'm glad we didn't do it in August. The water must be  
boiling then.

Larry Z