Carved out by the Colorado River, the Grand Canyon (nearly 1,500 m deep) is the most spectacular gorge in the world. Located in the state of Arizona, it cuts across the Grand Canyon National Park. Its horizontal strata retrace the geological history of the past 2 billion years. There are also prehistoric traces of human adaptation to a particularly harsh environment.
The Grand Canyon is among the earth’s greatest on-going geological spectacles. Its vastness is stunning, and the evidence it reveals about the earth’s history is invaluable. The 1.5-kilometer (0.9 mile) deep gorge ranges in width from 500 m to 30 km (0.3 mile to 18.6 miles). It twists and turns 445 km (276.5 miles) and was formed during 6 million years of geologic activity and erosion by the Colorado River on the upraised earth’s crust. The buttes, spires, mesas and temples in the canyon are in fact mountains looked down upon from the rims. Horizontal strata exposed in the canyon retrace geological history over 2 billion years and represent the four major geologic eras.
About My Photos:
We visited the Grand Canyon National Park at the time when California was experiencing some of their worst forest fires. As a result the visibility was greatly reduced because of the smoke which was travelling in the winds and air currents.
I was hoping for more clear and colourful photos but you take what you can get, and I was happy to have just visited and taken the photos I was lucky enough to get.
Our Tour:
We arrived just after opeining and wanted to miss the masses of people so decided to enter from the East and venture Westward through the park. Therefore the first sight we saw was the Grand Canyon Watch Tower.
Grand Canyon Watch Tower.
This description comes from scienceviews.com and they state:
Build a structure that provides the widest possible view of Grand Canyon yet harmonizes with its setting: this was architect Mary Colter's goal when the Fred Harvey Company hired her in 1930 to design a gift shop and rest area at Desert View. Colter's answer was the Watchtower.
A perfectionist, Colter scrutinized every detail, down to the placement of nearly every stone. Each stone was handpicked for size and appearance. Weathered faces were left untouched to give the tower an ancient look. With a lavish, highly publicized dedication ceremony, the Watchtower opened in May 1933.
Some of the magnificent scenery:
Sunrise At Grand Canyon Mather Point - Daniel Nilsson in Arizona
They don't call the Grand Canyon "GRAND" because it is small. Thus It can't be covered in just one post.
More to come.
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