Today marks the 100th Birthday of Grand Canyon National Park! It has been 19 years since I was last at the Grand Canyon. As anyone knows who has seen this magical place it is awe inspiring when you see it for the very first time. Breathtaking, spectacular, unbelievable, remarkable, enormous, spiritual are just some of the words used to describe this place. I have only been to the South Rim nineteen years ago for New Year’s Day 2000 with the family. We enjoyed the momentous passing of the millennium sitting on the hood of the car (to stay a bit warmer) watching a starlit sky filled with more stars than the kids had ever seen before. It was a magical night knowing the passage of time was marked on the calendar, used by most of us today, by a millennium.
It is the second most visited national park (behind Great Smoky Mountains National Park – which yes I have a book on…) and because of these massive numbers of people at the park, it faces challenges of over use, management of the Colorado River system that fails to adequately adopt strategies for the protection and restoration of native animals, as well as cultural resources and wildlife habitat, sound and air pollution, mining just outside the park, and yes the effects of climate change are already apparent in the park.
I have not been to the north rim or even down below the rim more than a few hundred yards. It is on my list of things to do, along with visiting some of the Native American sites along the canyon. Here are four images from my last trip there for New Year’s Eve and New Year’s sunrise back on Jan 1, 2000. Yes, before digital.
Enjoy,
Richard
