Even though supposedly everything is still opened until Nov 1, the park was definitively in their "we're about to close" mode. The general store was closed, as were the campground's showers. The lodge was closed as well as all bathrooms except for some porta-potties set up for the winter. I went around the lodge to follow the short Bright Angel Point trail: structurally like a miniature Angels Landing being a promontory jutting into the Canyon, but all paved and no chains needed to hold on to! From here, you cannot see the Colorado river as it is hidden. Think of the canyon as an inverted Sierra: it slopes gradually on the north side (west side for Sierras), and is steep on the south side (east side for the Sierras). Apparently this is because the north side is higher and gets more precipitation which carves its side more aggressively. The canyon was a bit hazy, but panels describe it as its normal state as it acts as a sink for everything around it. The fact that you could see mountains far away indicated that it was not a really bad day. The views were gorgeous, and I'll let the photos speak for themselves:
I met a nice woman from Portland who took a wrong turn on her bike from the campground and ended up at the visitor center instead of the North Kaibab trailhead. She went back the way she came via the Briddle Path, and I'll meet her again later hiking on the Uncle Jim trail.
The North Kaibab trail is the only trail going down into the canyon, but I was not ready to go on an overnighter at this time. But the trailhead is also the start of the Ken Patrick trail which has a side loop leading to the Uncle Jim overlook where you can see all the switchbacks of the Kaibab trail from across the way. I almost got lost because I had not realized that the fork in the trail was a real one. Only the right side looked well-traveled and that's the one that I followed. By chance it was the correct one. By doing the loop clockwise, I ended up high on another promontory jutting out, and had nice views along the way:
Eventually you reach an official rest area with parking spots for your horse, and a solar powered toilet. What more do you want?
It's then a short distance to the overlook:
This night was a little warmer 41F, but I couldn't tell because I was better bundled in.