Crying is only ok in two places: funerals and the Grand Canyon.

—Ron Swanson, Parks and Recreation

It was 5 a.m., and I drove the paved, straight road to the Grand Canyon National Park shuttle stop. I had 30 steps on my Fitbit, which I spent loading up the car from my adjacent camping spot. I filled my pack with four liters of water: two for me, two for my dog, Knox. We were up that morning to hike South Kaibob, a strenuous trail into the canyon that a trail site for hikers told me took two hours, but doorway-sized red signs in the park said could take up to six.

I was on a road trip from Boston to Seattle, and I spent each morning hiking national forests along the way with Knox. Each night, I looked up a trail for the next morning and picked one I thought we would enjoy. Although I had some suspicion that the Grand Canyon might be more spectacular than other hikes I had done, I still expected the day to go like all the rest: walk up to a trailhead, hike, and then return to my car for the day’s drive.

The parking lot near the shuttle stop, the only way to get to South Kaibob, was flat and expansive. Uniform yellow lines stained the smooth ground, all together forming hundreds of spots. The lot was flanked by a homogeneously beige visitor center, coffee shop, information stands, and of course, the shuttle. The all-too-familiar smell of coffee and engine fuel wafted into my nose.

If I had not been at the visitor center the day before, I would have thought I wandered into a mall. Yet, behind the off-white sidewalks, down railed and even steps, lay the canyon. When I walked onto the viewing platform just 24 hours ago, my legs slowed down. My sense of perspective was thrown out the window. “Grand” took on a whole new meaning. I became engulfed in a way a picture could never capture. It felt like all my other senses had to quiet so my eyes could struggle to absorb the magnitude of the canyon. I could attempt to describe what I saw, but every collection of words I know that try to do so fail. So instead, I will leave you with Ron Swanson’s words, and admit that I cried a little.

Brought back to the present by a loud family in louder outfits, I walked to the promenade to wait for the shuttle. I sat on the steel coffee shop chair and called the backcountry office as my laminated pamphlet instructed me to do.

“Hi, I was just calling to inform you that I was going to bring my service dog on my hike to South Kaibob this morning.”

“The canyon can be extremely hot and strenuous for dogs, and we would caution against hiking with a dog,” the ranger answered. Looking at my dog, muscled and short haired, outfitted with a bright aqua ice-soaked bandana and lightweight purple rubber booties, a first aid kit and collapsible water bowl attached to his pack, I assured the ranger we were prepared.

“What is your service dog trained to do? ” she asked. I proceeded to tell her Knox is a trained psychiatric service dog, to which she responded, “because there are mules on the trail, unless he’s like a seeing eye dog or something, we can’t really let him on. But, because it sounds like you are looking for a more remote experience, I can recommend a spot to you: Shoshone Point.” An image of a ruffled mule kicking a Hawaiian-shirt-wearing vacationer off the 6,000-meter cliff side, his screams drowning in the depths of the expanse, prompted me to ask for directions to the approved destination.

The ranger told me it would be far down the adjacent road with a small parking lot leading to a hidden trail. I set off on the journey, again in my car, past more steel-bolted signs and 90-degree-cornered intersections. I thought I’d found it when I approached five single parallel parking spots with a small clearing in the trees to the side.

Exiting the car, my feet hit the first actual dirt since I’d been here. Trees pushed in on me from both sides, their twisting roots testing my ankles. The path wound like a snake through grass, and I followed it until we hit asphalt. A thick, two-meter-wide lane unfurled in front of me, following the flat rim of the now visible canyon. I wondered if this tarmac road would lead to the remote point I was looking for, but I guessed “remote” could all be relative at this point. I took it as far as it would lead me, which ended up being a large expanse, the size of several football fields.

A vehicle road led to this opening as well, with a foam-padded lifting gate letting in the streamlined opalescent buses. Walking across the area, I arrived at the edge of the rim. Vegetation had been cleared away, and a trail cut into the canyon. Rocks lined either side of the path on the sunken mountain peaks, winding over the crests so visibly it reminded me of the Great Wall of China, if only the path had walls and the desert were forest. I asked the person next to me if I had found Shoshone Point. He told me I’d managed to walk to South Kaibob, my original hiking goal, which is when I noticed the rest of my surroundings. To the side, a double-walled pen with thick opal steel bars housed dozens of shuffling mules. It looked like a roofless jail yard, with heavy swinging doors and claustrophobic proportions. Concrete signs housed maps and park information.

I asked the person next to me how to get to Shoshone Point.

“That’s a long ways away,” he said. “You gonna do that with your dog?”

“It seems like the only thing I can do with him,” I respond.

“Well yeah, this is a national park,” he replied, like I would know what that means.

“We’ve done a bunch of hikes in the White Mountains and never had a problem.”

“Well, that’s a national forest,” he responded. My blank stare prompted him to go on: “National parks are run by the Department of Interior, and their goal is preservation and bringing experiences to the public. National forests, like the White Mountains, are run by the Department of Agriculture, and their goal is recreation.”

With this knowledge, I started to think through where I had been so far as I made my way back to the car. I thought of my community park I went to as a kid, with its lemonade stand and visitor center; how much of the Grand Canyon was park, and why did I expect for it to be none at all? But after driving another ten air-conditioned minutes, I finally found what I could now recognize as the right spot. It was unmarked: no sign and no pavement. The parking lot was a small, cleared spot nestled in the surroundings. It could fit maybe ten cars, and my tires crunched over the uneven gravel as I pulled in. The dirt felt soft under my feet, unpacked and crumbly. It blended into the tree roots, colored the characteristic reddish-brown of the canyon.

The trail was easy to find; its opening, although less obvious, seemed much more similar to the trails I had started countless times before. Large firs burst out of the ground on each side of the pathway, with about 20 meters between each to allow for the large web of roots I could tell stretched beneath. Branches were free to hang over the walkway, free to poke me in the face or guard the shrubs below. The pines were a dusty light green, less luminous than the shiny emeralds that grow in the damp northeast. Relentless sun beat through the trees, creating a honeycomb-like pattern on the pathway, the resulting shadow providing a necessary reprieve for myself and the mountain lions that roamed these parts.

I walked through the forest with rapt attention. I focused on listening for other people or animals, none of which ever came. I looked at the ground for spiky plants and stray branches. My mind was engaged with analyzing my surroundings: don’t trip over that, listen for that sound there my thoughts hummed to me. Time moved differently; suddenly it was 30 minutes later and the path showed the natural signs of a cliff edge: the trees grew sparser, the ground rose, and the wind howled a little louder. In a sure sign of the end of my journey, a small manmade stall came into view. When I opened the door, the pungent smell of feces hit me in the face, and when my eyes cleared, I found a small steel toilet, unconnected to plumbing.

A minute or two past the stall, I found my way onto a veranda. Wooden shade roofs and picnic benches scattered the area, accompanying the odd spindly tree that dared to live so close to the edge. I walked over to the benches and my knees creaked as I sat down in the shade. Knox crawled under the bench as he always does and dug himself a hole in the dirt to cool down. I drank long sips from my water bottle and let some droplets run down my shirt. I breathed out the kind of long sigh you only can after a long walk, and let my ears ring in the echoing silence of the valley. The breeze that built over the open area rushed over my skin while I settled in and pulled out my lunch.

A pair of women approached and sat down next to me. We talked for a long time, and at the end, they asked me how I liked the view of the point. “Isn’t this the point?” I asked.

“No, it’s down that way. We’re too old to go there now, but you should do it.” They were pointing to a gravel lane, too small to be considered a trail.

I set off not knowing what I would find; what would be more spectacular than what I had already seen? The pathway was rocky, and the branches and weeds had not been cleared away. It was something you would find in the canyon: sharp grey rocks with jagged edges formed by years of treks and weather. Some were slanted and loose; each step first required a test—a light tap, and then firmer pressure for purchase. This first 30 feet of overhang was at maybe a 15-degree incline, followed by a steep 20 foot drop leading to an ridgeline. Going down the drop involved pushing off four-to-five foot tall rocks with rugged edges, while knowing a misstep would lead to a deadly plummet. Knox followed behind me closer than he usually did; he could understand the danger, but he kept moving forward as long as I did.

The clearing I found myself on, however, was worth the risk. A small circle of rock jutted out from the maybe three-foot-wide path I took. It was suspended 6,000 feet and extended from the path so far that if you peered over the edge, you’d see no supporting rock. It felt like I was standing on a boat dock, but instead of water, it was canyon below me. I was simultaneously standing in the middle and on top of the largest gorge in the world. Far in the distance, I could even see the small streak of blue indicating the Colorado River. I knelt down in the rush of the magnitude of this place, my feet digging into the ground for traction.

I took out my phone to take a selfie with my dog. In that selfie, you can see only canyon behind us. I crouched down telling myself it was to get a better angle, but really I couldn’t take my eyes off the edge while standing up. Sweat ran down my arm as I reached for my phone. My feet finally stopped moving long enough for me to feel them throb. I angled the camera to try to capture us and the canyon below; peaks and valleys stretched out in the space between myself and Knox. With the cliff’s edge just inches away and the sun at its full midday force, behind our smiles a hint of fear and exhaustion shines through our eyes.

When I look back at that picture, I see first the photo I took the day before, on the original veranda’s lookout point. There, I had asked another tourist to take the picture. I knelt down to put myself and Knox in the same frame, not because I needed to or because my legs were tired. The railing bars that filled the background would prevent a fall, and the nice paved sidewalk forged an easy path for my unwary body.

There are many similarities between the two photos. Either could go in an album with the caption “My trip to the Grand Canyon.” In both, you can see the canyon behind me. I am kneeling with Knox, with my hair braided and sweat beading on my brow. In both, my eyes glint with the knowledge that I am standing on the edge of one of the most extraordinary places I have ever seen, but the earlier one tells the story of an experience others paved for me, while the later tells of an experience I earned myself.

 

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