Grand Canyon Mish-Mash!

What can I say, I love the Grand Canyon! I have been there many times. Actually, I just counted, in the last 22 years, I have not been there in a calendar year only 3 times, 3 years I have missed (yeah I have been there on both Covid Years!). Some years I have been there multiple times. I have seen the canyon in every season, during every time of the day and the night. However, I still feel like that I haven't seen anything about the canyon! I haven't even walked 10% of the trails. Majority of my trips are at the South Rim. I feel like the North Rim remained completely unexplored to me. It is still so inaccessible! Basically only open 4-5 months of the year for all practical purposes! Sigh! That will be again someday (yeah I have been to North Rim too quite a few times, but not as much as I like to), some other trip to the North Rim. Okay, only the South Rim this time.

The point is, as per as my thought process, I can never have enough Grand Canyon. It remains my most visited national park (may not be my favorite! Take That!!), and probably will be for a few long time. I think I have been to the Grand Canyon National Park about 25 times (sorry, I have lost count, and I am not organized regarding my photographs), the close second is probably the Rocky Mountain National Park with numbers around 12 or so. So as you can understand, it will take a long time to catch up, may be during the retirement.

Why

That's not a difficult question. I have been a student of geology for for nearly three decades. If you study geosciences, the Grand Canyon is a national laboratory, where you can actually see the history of the planet earth and colorado plateau, from 3 Billion years back to about 250 Million years, and then tectonic episodes all the way to the present day. You can observe the history of a great river (The mighty Colorado), and see how it shaped the land and the people along with it. Although people were mostly absent much of its history, but when they were present, they left some very distinct marks.

Also the Grand Canyong was relatively close to me, throughout my time in the United States. It is also accessible thoughout the year, at least the south rim, a big plus, which is not the case for most of the national parks in the north during winter.

So I walked to this Yavapai Geology Museum building numeous times. Walked every inch of the the trail of geology many times, alone, with my whole family, with individual kids, with my wife. I have done all possible combinations and it never gets old.

And at the end of the day, I can always sit by a fire, which I will make every evening, and relax and cook dinner. Watch my kids grow up in the Mather Campground is probably going to be one of my fondest memories of my life.