The Grand Canyon. Whatever language you put it in I suppose the name speaks for itself, it is nothing if not grand. Other words could be immense, spectacular, massive, jaw-dropping, impressive…the list goes on and on. It's the kind of place that makes you feel insignificant, even the multitudes of camera wielding, socks and sandals wearing, wrinkled tourists are swallowed up by this vast area. My first glimpse of it was actually one of the side canyons that feed into the main one, and that was big enough to lose probably the entire Bradford metropolitan area in (is that a bad thing?!). I was visiting the South Rim, so named because, well I'm sure you don't need me to spell it out, Americans are very literal! If you have ever visited from Vegas you'll go to the North Rim, where the Hoover Dam is situated, but as the whole thing is 277 miles long it's difficult to hit both areas in one day and still manage to actually see the place and appreciate it properly. Thus the South Rim was home for a day.

The Grand Canyon was carved out by the pure power of the Colorado river, and it's hard to believe when you see it that water could have that power - I mean I thought that the canyons in Australia and Kata Tjuta were impressive but this is just another level. For a start you can hardly see the Colorado river from the top edge and the tiny bit you do see looks about an inch wide and like the slowest running water ever! The reality when you are down there is that the river is anything from 150 to 300 metres wide and would sweep you away as soon as one little piggy was dipped in. Such is the power of the mighty Colorado. The hawks wheeling above, floating on the updrafts and swooping down to hunt for tea look like tiny gnats in front of the multi-hued backdrop.

The colours were another thing I was surprised by - I mean come on, rocks aren't different colours, are they? Well if the Grand Canyon is anything to go by the range of hues is nothing short of astounding. Yes I saw different coloured rocks when I was in Australia but they were black and white compared to here - nearly white, lemon yellow, ochre, burnt orange, chocolate, ebony, any range of red and yellow tones you name it and you can probably see it there - the multiple striations create a rainbow of rock. As I was visiting at the end of the wet season it was also surprisingly green - grassy hummocks abounded on the flat expanses which I did not expect to see at all - if I'd have come in the summer it would have been a lot dustier and drier apparently.

As part of my tour we did a canyon rim walk, which consisted of an hours walk down the dustiest path known to mankind, staining everyone's shoes a nice browny yellow. On the way we were introduced to the agave plant - also known as the tequila plant as it is the basis of that drink of lost nights. My kind of plant anyway haha. I tried some pine nuts as well - they are not as good by themselves as they are toasted or in pesto and that is no lie! That aside our tour guide told us an interesting fact - of the millions of people who visit the Grand Canyon every year only 5% go below the rim, so yay for us, the elite 5% (which still makes hundreds of thousands of people but I'll conveniently gloss over that). We hung around (literally in my case as I was clambering around the rocks like a mountain goat, just how I roll) for a while just absorbing the view, with people walking past us in various states of exhaustion - the heat in the bottom of the canyon is hotter than that on the top as it gets trapped and it can get pretty warm down there. People die of heat exhaustion and dehydration easily - there are signs everywhere warning you to keep up fluids and stuff so I guess it must happen a fair bit to unprepared folk. You can walk right into the bottom of the canyon and stay in a cabin and go on the various walks actually within the canyon but they book up a year in advance so I'm going to have to plan ahead next time (and there will be a next time!).

We were staying for the sunset so drove over to an amazing vantage point that looked out across the canyon. As the sun set in myriads of purple and orange the shadows lengthened and deepened changing the mood of the canyon to a brooding ominous space, interspersed with bright splashes of red where the dying sun touched the cliff faces. Sadly this also meant that as soon as that sun set behind the rocks it was freezing cold and my shorts were no barrier to the chill! We were all bundled back into the van and a sleepy group of people were dropped off an hour or so later - just in time for me to have a couple hours sleep before my ridiculously early train to Albuquerque!

Becca