Images from Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona

This description was stolen from another of my writings, “The Coolest Thing Ever Seen” under the Naturelated tab. For that, I do apologize.

One of the most stationary places in the world, the Grand Canyon, deserves top billing as one of the coolest places ever.  It is completely spectacular and mesmerizing.  When I am here, I so enjoy watching people who are seeing it for the first time: mouths agape, eyes wide with wonder, child-like smiles stretching from ear to ear.  Once, when I was staying at one of the lodges on the South Rim, I sat with an older German man on a bench overlooking the canyon a couple of evenings in a row, enjoying the scenery, our discussions, and the delicious cigars he so generously offered.  On the second night, I was describing my earlier walk down to the three mile Resthouse (and its 2000 foot elevation change) on the Bright Angel Trail.  He thoroughly appreciated my description of the challenging hike and wanted to see the photographs I had taken.  As he was scrolling through pictures on my Nikon camera, I asked what he had been doing the past couple of days.  He responded, “Me?  I have been sitting on this bench for three days now.  I occasionally get up to walk along the rim and get a bite to eat, but I always come back to this bench.”  When pressed to explain why he was sitting in this one place, he replied, “I will never be here again.  When I go back to Germany, I want to remember this beautiful vantage point.  Now, I have memorized this view and will be able to recall it until my dying day.”  My daily hikes along the rim and down into the canyon paled in comparison to the masterpiece he was painting inside his brain.