THE GRAND CANYON, NORTH RIM, ARIZONA

I hadn't been to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon since I was about 7 years old, so I had no memory of the approach. The drive to get there alone is a real wonder to behold. from the desert floor, you go up and up and up in to a massive pine forest. There were almost no other cars on the road. I felt like Jack Nicholson heading up to the Overlook Hotel in the Shining. You know, those aerial shots of his volkswagen winding in and out of pine forest. *SIDENOTE: The exact same footage was used in the closing credits of the theatrical release of Bladerunner. The studio wanted a happy ending, so they added the corny voiceover and showed Deckard & Rachel driving along the mountain road, having presumably escaped the clutches of Edward James Olmos and the other Bladerunners.
CLICK ME >> She won't live, but then again, who does?

But I digress. You wind in and around these hills way way up there at 8000 feet. You feel like you're on top of the world. But you are teeming with expectation, knowing that any moment you will come in to view of the Grand Canyon. It's very exciting. Then all of a sudden your car is shot out of the woods like a cannon ball in to these incredibly epic green meadows. The scale of these meadows can not really be described and certainly not captured on my lousy camera. At first sight, it is nothing short of breathtaking. The scale of you and your puny car and this skinny sliver of a road compared to the gargantuan open sky and breezy green fields is truly awe-inspiring. You are instantly humbled by nature's irrefutable majesty.

Like I said, this picture does nothing to capture it, but I post it here out of sincere reverence nevertheless.



The Grand Canyon itself needs no introduction. Either you have seen it and you understand, or you simply don't. Here's a few silly shots, but again, they pale in comparison to the incomprehensible scale of the thing itself. God bless Paul Bunyan and his lazy, axe-dragging habits.





We didn't have the time to do the hike down in to the canyon. It's at least a 3-day commitment, and Zion was calling me back home (big up Mr Marley for that). The sunset this day was marvelous. The western face of each canyon ridge blazed with orange and yellow fire for a few moments, then graciously transitioned in to darkness, swallowed in shadow. We drove back out the way we came in, racing across the green meadows in the final rays of sunlight. Dusk was upon us and the woodland creatures were venturing out in to the meadows en masse. A lone 4 point buck raced across the grass along side us for a spell, then leaped up a rocky slope back to the forest's edge. Rabbits darted across the road. A massive Golden Eagle sat perched on a burnt and twisted tree. A coyote trotted in and out of the headlight beams, his bushy tail bouncing along. We were heading north to Fredonia, a tiny town on the northern edge of Arizona.

We checked in to the Grand Canyon Motel, a small collection of musty cabins at the south end of town. At $39 a night, this was a bargain that couldn't be beat. A sweet old couple lived in the room right behind the front desk. They greeted us warmly and after a rapid cheek in, the husband lead us to our cabin. The grounds were crawling with a motley crew of stray cats of every breed.
"Wow. You got cats!" I exclaimed.
"Don't got mice!" he shot back
And that was the full extent of our conversation.





We dropped our bags and drove over the border to Kanab, where we were told there'd still be a restaurant or two that served past 9pm on a Saturday night. Sure enough there was a nice little place full of families just arrived for the last meal of the day.

After dinner I took a few pictures around town. It was all but deserted. Sometimes I go a little nuts with the long exposures.