Hermit Trail to Santa Maria Spring

Grand Canyon National Park, AZ

Kim and I hiked the Hermit Trail of the Grand Canyon in Grand Canyon National Park from the rim to Santa Maria Spring on Feb 15 2024. The first third of the hike was snowy (but not too icy), but the remainder was mostly dry. The trail is more remote than the South Kaibab Trail that we did the previous day. The entire trail is beautiful but the last third after the junction with the Dripping Springs trail is especially gorgeous as it winds through a red canyon to the hut at Santa Maria Spring.

We were also treated along the way to a Bighorn Sheep. We initially spotted a single antler on a “shelf” about 50 feet above us. After several pictures of the antler, the sheep stood up and gave us a long and majestic side view. For some reason, the animal then quickly descended from the shelf to stop in the trail about 20’ ahead of us!! It stood there for a few minutes (as we slowly backed up) before moving across the trail to graze at the edge of a very high and sheer cliff. It was an amazing once-in-a-lifetime experience.

This was a very fun hike!

Walk-Specific Map

Elevation Profile

Images

GPX Download

A sanitized GPX file of our hike is here.

Summary Information

NUM trackID Primary Description Distance CumDist DeltaElev
1 GCHRMT01 Hermit Trail Hermit Trailhead to Waldron Tr Junction 1.31 1.31 -1215
2 GCHRMT02 Hermit Trail Waldron Tr Junction to Dripping Springs Tr Junction 0.30 1.62 -226
3 GCHRMT03 Hermit Trail Dripping Springs Tr Junction to Santa Maria Springs 0.54 2.16 -228
4 GCHRMT03 Hermit Trail Santa Maria Springs to Dripping Springs Tr Junction 0.54 2.71 228
5 GCHRMT02 Hermit Trail Dripping Springs Tr Junction to Waldron Tr Junction 0.30 3.01 226
6 GCHRMT01 Hermit Trail Waldron Tr Junction to Hermit Trailhead 1.31 4.32 1215