The Grand Canyon

What an amazing place! You really cannot comprehend just how big of an area this place is or how beautiful it is. There is not a picture in the world that can capture its size or beauty. It is just completely breath taking. If you have never been to the Grand Canyon you are truly missing out on one of the most amazing sights in the world!

Although beautifully amazing it is also a pretty dangerous place. In conversation with a park ranger I learned on the average 11 people die here a year. This influenced me to buy this book I am currently reading, Over the Edge: Death in Grand Canyon by Michael P. Ghiglieri and Thomas M. Myers. It tells the gripping accounts of all known fatal mishaps at the Grand Canyon. It is a pretty interesting read.

It seems the Grand Canyon instills the rules of Darwinism quite well. In most accounts, death occurs after someone performs an action of stupidity that you just shouldn’t do next to a 600-foot drop off.

I blame this on the “911 mentality.” The thought process that rescue is just a cell phone call away if you place yourself in harms way and need saving. Even during my visit I witnessed people who seemed to think the national park is like an amusement park.

Nothing could be further from that misguided perception. Walt Disney had no hand in building the Grand Canyon. The canyon was built by nature. When you mess up in nature, nature makes you pay for your mistakes or lack of good judgment, and all to often, it ends tragically. Just the way it is.