Canyon Moods

Canyon

When we say “Canyon,” of course, we speak of Arizona’s Grand Canyon, the grandest canyon of them all. We mean no disrespect nor do we intend to belittle so many of our other canyons, whose name and fame have spread far beyond our borders. If we were to obliterate Grand Can-yon from our geography, Arizona would still have just cause to claim the title of “The Canyon State.” What other state can boast of such can-yon jewels as Canyon de Chelly, Marble, Tsegi, Kanab, Oak Creek, Salt River, Sabino, Aravaipa, and Texas Canyon, to name but a few of many. Our canyons differ as people differ but they have much in common: impressive scenic beauty, lavishly rich coloration, and formidably sculptured components. It is not true, as one unobserving traveler remarked about our canyons, "When you have seen one, you have seen them all."

Moods

As a scenic area Grand Canyon was given a magnificent stage setting. Travel with us, if you will, to some of the West's outstanding scenic wonders: Bryce Canyon National Park, Zion Canyon National Park, Cedar Breaks National Monument, all in Southern Utah, and to Monument Valley in Northern Arizona and Southern Utah. As you approach all of these, you are gradually prepared for the climax of the journey. Now then, travel with us, if you will, the high roads to the canyon north from Williams to the South Rim or southward from Jacob Lake to the North Rim. Nothing prepares you for what is to come. There is no forewarning. Suddenly there it is before you in all its splendor and glory, almost shocking in its depths and immensity, a triumphant creation of the Divine Sculptor, a mammoth paint pot in which the colors are alive and everchanging. One would have to be both insentient and insensitive, indeed, not to be deeply moved, almost staggered, by the emotional impact of coming upon the canyon for the first time. This is, truly, “the big whammy!” of travel experiences! If you are making your first trip to the canyon, we suggest you approach it directly from the north or the south. From the east, via Cameron, there are visible indications of things to come such as glimpses of the Lower Gorge of the Little Colorado, quite a chunk of impressive scenery in itself, and distant views of the canyon's upper reaches miles before you come to the canyon's rim. This preview from the east, however tantalizing, takes some of the punch out of the haymaker the canyon can have on your senses when you come upon it abruptly, without warning.

The canyon always has been and always will be a challenge to the painter, the writer, the poet and the photographer. Canyon literature is quite extensive and a bookshelf on the subject would be a formidable addition to anyone's library; yet, somehow it seems the essence of the canyon eludes the printed page. Canyon walls tell the very story of earth and when you trudge the trails into the canyon's depths millions upon millions of years of earth's history whisper their secrets to you, and you feel small and transient when you realize man's existence on this planet could be told in the upper half inch of the canyon's strata. The geologic story of the canyon has been written many times, but still it seems the canyon's ancient secrets avoid capture by the scholars' learned words. The canyon can be the despair of the photographer and at the same time a thrilling delight. Sun and shifting shadow, the ever changing colors of the canyon's walls, spires, and buttes are tempting and challenging to the camera's eye and that is why the canyon is probably the most photographed of all earth's natural wonders. But you don't have to be a photographer to enjoy and appreciate its immensity and power.

"Swirling Mists - Grand Canyon"

The canyon is a mighty, delicate, sensitive instrument responding to every nuance of time and the weather, and to catch on film the subtle changes of the canyon's personality from minute to minute, from day to day, season to season, is something over which the master behind the lens can never hope to be completely triumphant. One of our most valued, esteemed and expert contributors has visited the canyon over one hundred and fifty times, each trip requiring a long automobile drive, each trip using up so many sheets of color film his canyon file now bulges with several thousand photographs on the subject and he still comes back for more. Why? Because the canyon has that effect on people with an eye for beauty and the mind and soul to appreciate that magnificence, and there is hope the next trip might be more rewarding than the last.

We have published many canyon photographs in this magazine in the past; yet, on these two pages are three photographs unlike any that have appeared herein before. Here is shown a ground fog that covers for a hundred miles or so the plateau in which the canyon was carved. This occurs very, very rarely. The photographs were taken from a plane above the junction of the Colorado and Little Colorado Rivers and show the fog spilling into the canyon, dissolving five hundred feet below the canyon's rim, where warmer air is rising.

"Dissolving Mists - Grand Canyon"

The moods of the canyon are many and varied and that is why so many people return time and time again to behold the canyon, the changing, mysterious, inscrutable canyon, the canyon of sun and shadow, the canyon of brooding silence, the canyon of carved wonders, the canyon as old as time, but forever new, the canyon that has a message for each person who peers into its depths, and the message is never the same for the next person.Millions of people have in the past traveled to that remote part of Arizona which encompasses the Grand Canyon. Millions of more people in the future will travel the same paths and be rewarded with all that the canyon has to offer. Whatever you are looking for, the canyon has to offer in abundance, whether colorful scenery or the grandeur achieved by the patient work of the sun and rain and wind and river working together for so many millions of years it staggers the mind and imagination to even contemplate. Grand Canyon has an eloquent story to tell. It tells that story grandiloquently.