We scrambled back out of Slate Canyon and made the short trek over to Boucher Creek, a perennial stream where we recouped for a bit. We have a permit for two more nights in the canyon, with short hiking days between them, but we are both feeling pretty wiped out at this point from everything, and we’re both feeling ready to get home and be done hiking for a while. So we decided to take an alternate route out of the canyon today, up the Boucher Trail, supposedly one of the harder trails on the south side. It took the rest of the day to climb out of the canyon, and luckily the trail wasn’t too bad other than a few scrambles here and there. We got to the top at Hermit’s Rest and took the Park Service shuttle back to the village, and from there got a ride to Tusayan. It was dark at that point, so we decided to just grab dinner and stay in town tonight.