With the semester over, a friend and I drove north to the Grand Canyon for a few days. Neither of us had been before. And wow, was it spectacular. The photos here are from just the first evening--our first glimpses before returning to Kaibab National Forest to camp--taken from Mather Point and the surrounding area. There are many more to come. (To browse a gallery of the images larger than shown below, click on any photo.)
It's impossible to capture just how vast the canyon is. Just one-third of the canyon is visible from Mather Point. Here is one view, from the so-called South Rim, looking north-northwest...
And another, looking approximately east-northeast.
USGS geologist Clarence Dutton studied the Colorado Plateau region in the late 19th century. He thought that many of the rock features in the canyon resembled ancient temples from the Middle East and Asia, so he named the features accordingly. Personally, I think it's a bit of a stretch--admittedly more so for some than others--but I enjoyed trying to identify them nonetheless.
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In the center is Isis Temple, slightly to the right is the flat-topped Cheops Pyramid, and the white peak toward the right (east)
is Buddha Temple. The peaks of both "temples" are over 7000 ft (2100 m) above sea level, similar to the rims of the canyon. |
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| Further to the east is Zoroaster Temple, the white peak left of center. |
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| Part of the south rim in the foreground and Isis Temple in the background. |
You hear a lot about the rock layers (strata) in the Grand Canyon, which accumulated over millions of years and embody the geological history of the region. As spectacular as they are (I'll share more about them soon), visually I was just as struck by the effect of layers upon layers of canyons, valleys, cliffs, and peaks, receding into the distance.
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Behind and to the left (west) of Isis Temple is Shiva Temple,
and further left are The Temple of Osiris and Tower of Set. |
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Cedar Ridge extends northward from the south rim (bottom right), topped by O'Neill Butte,
and culminating in Skeleton Point. |
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| Topping Cedar Ridge is O'Neill Butte. The strata are particularly visible here. |
As impressive as the panoramic views are, looking down into every nook and cranny is just as satisfying. There is something of interest in every direction.
Under the harsh Arizona sun, the light shows the gorgeous colours of the canyon, but the shade is always a relief. The contrast between the glowing and shaded rock is both beautiful and a challenge a for photography.
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| Shadows of people positing for pictures look a little bit like rock art. |
The forest goes right up to the edge of the canyon and then down the side, changing with the elevation along with the temperature and precipitation gradients. I'll tell you a bit more about the ecology later, with photos of most of animals and wildflowers that we saw throughout the week.
