Saturday 5 May 2007

More Grand Canyon

I know that the Grand Canyon was last week's adventure, but I have a few more images to share with you. I apologise for the delay. I needed to take a break to recover from the trauma of sorting through the hundreds of photographs I took there.

One of the attractions of the Grand Canyon is a ruined Indian village.




From the village it is possible to look out across the trees and see the San Francisco Mountain peak. It's not in San Francisco, of course. It's in Arizona, along with the London Bridge. You don't believe me, do you? But it's true. The London Bridge retired to Lake Havasu City, Arizona.




There is also a remarkable lookout tower constructed in the 1930s. There is a store downstairs, and a staircase that winds its way up through storeys of traditional style art and cool shadows.


For all that is impressive in the canyon, there are the usual unfortunate signs of human idiodicy.


Why do the places that fill us with awe bring out this urge in people? Why do we feel the need to scratch our names into the ages? Or worse, to deface the rocks with commentary as below: "A big ass mo' fuck'n Canyon."





At least this one had a sense of humour.

We came upon a path that leads down into the Canyon. I scrambled downwards for about 15 minutes, then reluctantly, and much more slowly, returned to the top. I would have liked to go on, to keep walking until I could touch the river below. Alas, I did not have the time, or the provisions, or the ability to breathe at high altitude with my battered ribs and shoulder.

You can just see the edge of the path in the bottom left of the shot above. It's a steep climb, but the views are well worth it.

2 comments:

chris condron said...

imagine the conversations one could have on a walk like that!!!!

I have also asked the question why people scratch such intelligent comments as" i was fckin here" into mother nature. true i would understand it if they said something like" i am in awe of the beauty and power that mother nature has..it is humbling" i could at least understand....maybe they feel inadequate...

Unknown said...

but chris, sometimes they do write such things. check out http://www.villagevoice.com.au/article/20070508/LFS07/705080346/-1/lfs/Writing+on+the+wall+for+tree
- "Two Inner West tree lovers have created an anonymous ode to a paperbark tree recently removed from Loftus Street.
...
"Fourteen lines of white script outlined in green have been painstakingly painted onto the brickwork. The emphatic verses lamenting the loss of the tree begin with "They've killed the tree that was like a friend of flesh and blood to me", and conclude: "Dear God! how ugly is the street, how dull without the tree."