Havasupai Village Havasupai Hike

(My) Havasupai Village Description:

After 8 miles of hiking from the parking lot (took us 2.5 hours) you will start to see some civilization. You will be hiking in on the right side of the canyon which will put most of the village to your left as you hike down through the village until you take a left at the church and cut through the village heading for the falls. The village looks a little run down over all. Not as bad as some descriptions I have heard of the village at all. The yards and houses seem fairly well kept, but the closest hardware store is 3 hours away and everything has to be brought in by pack animal or helicopter. So you can imagine that they make due in some areas. The locals are courteous, but not overly friendly although I was just hiking through and I didn't really try to get to know anyone either.

The short time I spent in this village made me realize how little I know about the customs of the Natives of this land and how they now feel about Americans overall. It seems impossible not to remember what the Native Americans have been through in the last 200 years and wonder how they still feel about it. Traveling through and staying near the Havasupai Reservation and the Havasu 'Baaja people gave me a new respect for their history and a desire to study the history of the Native Americans.

The first building I came to on the left was a house/general store. You won't find the store on the official havasupaitribe.com website because it's not owned by the reservation, this store is owned by a local family. We stopped here on our way in to the village to see what it was like. We found a friendly face, cold drinks and more (covered below). After this first house we traveled about 3/4 or a mile before we ran into the "Office" where all hikers are supposed to check in pay your hiking/camping fees and get a permit, which you wire tie right on to your backpack. In the busy seasons I have heard of some waiting up to 30-40 minutes waiting in line for their permits. We started out early and may have been the second people to check-in that day so it only took about 10 minutes.

Once you get out of the office you will see the "helipad" within a few hundred feet. The village store is just to the right here and directly after the helipad is the cafe. Making purchases at any of these places will support the town and it's people. After the cafe you will travel about 100 feet before you make a turn left at the church to go towards the campgrounds or a short right to get to the lodge. After you take this left you still have about 1.5 miles of deep sand hiking before you get to the falls. From here to the end of the village you will only see houses and corrals. There are other buildings in the Havasupai village I have only mentioned the important ones for travelers.

Havasupai Cafe:

While we waited for our helicopter flight out we dropped by the cafe for a bite to eat. The prices where much more inexpensive than I thought they would be. I was looking forward to trying Indian fry bread, but they were only serving breakfast at the time. I ordered eggs, bacon, hash browns and toast and paid $4.50. I was surprised at the low price because the general stores are double retail of a normal store. The breakfast was good and the cafe was clean and well kept. There are also restrooms here for customers.

Havasupai General Stores:

The first general store you come to is the only one I personally went to. Prices at both general stores are about double the price of a regular gas station. If your addicted to caffeine and candy like I am you may want to load up on your way down so you don't have to hike a 4 mile round trip for a mountain dew and a candy bar. Here is a list of the types of items they had on hand.

• Gatorade
• Soda (Pepsi, Coke and so on)
• Candy all kinds
• Ice-cream bars and icy treats
• Canned foods
• Breads? Maybe can't remember
• Not sure if they had batteries, but I think they did
• Some kinds of film

This is only the stuff I remember. I hear they run out of items on busy weeks so don't leave your food at home hoping to find food in the village, you may end up going without. I have even heard of the cafe running out of food.

The other general store is across from the cafe and my wife went in and looked around. She said it was much like the first store only the gatorade was not refrigerated. After a 2 mile hike in deep sand and 90 degree heat, this actually seemed to offend her at the time. :)

Havasupai Lodge:

I wish now that I would have stopped and taken a look at the lodge so I could add better info to this site. If anyone has personal experience with the lodge please email me the info and I will put it up for everyone to use. Email sewing (at) havasufalls.net. All I can do is regurgitate information from brochures. NOTE: If you are set on staying at the lodge you had better call early. We tried to make reservations for May 04 before Dec of 03 and could not get a room. In May all the rooms for Sept were reserved. Here is the info for the lodge:

Havasupai Lodge accommodations include two double beds, private bath and air-conditioning.
No telephone, TV, or roll-away beds are available. All 24 rooms are non-smoking.

Lobby hours : 8 a.m. -5 p.m. 7 days a week.

To make reservations, please call: (928)448-2111 or (928)448-2201

Or email: lodge@havasupaitribe.com

Email us your: First Name, Last Name, Email Address, Phone Number,
Lodge or Campground, Dates Requested.

We will contact you if your requested dates are available.

Havasupai Office

All visitors have to sign in at the office to pay dues and get permits. You don't want to hike past it and have to go back.

Havasupai Post Office

The Supai Post Office is where visitors can buy stamps, mail letters and post cards which goes out on the only pack train mail in America. Take a moment and mail yourself a post card from here. It's the cheapest way to send anything on a pack mule.