We wanted to avoid the "corridor" trails (Kaibab, Bright Angel) and get into the real GC backcountry, so we did a rim-to-rim-to-rim (R2R2R) on the North and South Bass trails. These are about 20 miles NW (down river) from the usual Kaibab trails. But, the profiles are remarkably similar: R2R2R on Bass trails is 42.0 miles with 10700' of elevation gain, while on Kaibab trails it is 42.2 miles with 10500' of gain. The tricky part, of course, is that the North and South Bass trails are not linked by a bridge. While backpackers do this by waiting for a friendly rafter to ferry them across, we were doing this in a day and just swam it. Another way would be to lie on an inflatable pad (NeoAir, etc.) and paddle across. That would make a "multi-use gear" junky proud! Anyway, we had a fun outing and sure didn't see very many people! Here's our report: http://blog.ultimatedirection.com/r2r2r-alt/
