The Grand Canyon

The thing about the Grand Canyon is its scale. It makes much more intuitive sense that, like the Rio Grande, the valley is made by some major seismic disruption and the river runs through it, rather than that the whole thing was carved out by the Colorado rivers, but that is the case. The rivers are a a mile beneath the top of the canyon and from most of the rim cannot be seen. It must be wonderful to visit when you are young, healthy and fit. You can hike down the canyon and back or up the other side and stay at the bottom, (it's 6 hours down, 8 up), either just with a companion or a with a mule train to carry your stuff. You can ride horses along the rim paths or cycle the forest where the elk graze in blatant disregard of the zillions of tourists - unless one gets too close, or you can white water raft down the Colorado river. Sweetheart would be in her element.  But, we being old and sick and unfit, are confined to taking the shuttle bus along the rim to various viewpoints. After a while one viewpoint is much like another.

 The strata are the same wherever so having managed to get seats we just stayed on the bus. I did't even try to get sunset or sunrise pictures; I reckon you'd need a much better camera and probably film  but people set up their tripods well in advance by the dozen or score.   

The park service is currently being sued for religious discrimination by a creationist geologist. This Australian got his PhD in 1982 and then found God. He has been applying for leave to take rock samples to support his belief that there was a major flood 4300 years ago, and that the canyon is only thousands of years old not hundreds of millions. He has been denied on the basis he has no academic affiliations since 1982 and asked for precise GPS co-ordinates and photographs of the samples he wishes to take. He filed 5 days after trump signed the new religious discrimination law.

Tourism to the Canyon really took off when the Fred Harvey Co persuaded the Santa Fe railway to run a line from Williams. You can still ride on it though it is now diesel trains although there are some summer weekend steam specials. The company built the El Tovar hotel in a spectacular position at the end of the track 

and then employed Mary E J Coltar to design other buildings and interiors.

the lodge we stayed in was based on he original 1880s prospectors' cabin.