You didn't really think we were done with the Grand Canyon, did you?
There is another half to the Grand Canyon: the North Rim. It doesn’t open until June 15th, so it took me a while to get there, but get there I eventually did. The weather was not the best. I found a wide spot in the road to park my RV (the lot at the Visitor’s Center was full) and rode my trike 11 miles up to the rim, where I took these photos. The place I rode is the highest point on the canyon rim, somewhere in the neighborhood of 8100 feet. I felt all virtuous about riding that high until recently, when I rode to 9475 feet in Rocky Mountain National Park, which post will follow shortly.
OK, this is not really the North Rim. It is a picture of cloud shadows at the South Rim that I left out of my preceding post.
THIS is the North Rim, and you can see what the weather was like. I didn’t reach the rim until late afternoon, and fortunately it was not raining in the place where I was standing.
More rain over the canyon
There was actually as much sun as there was rain that day at the North Rim, and it made getting pictures quite a feat, as portions of the photo were in the sun, and therefore over-exposed, and other parts in deep shadow, and therefore under-exposed. Still, the rain brought out the intense colors in the rocks and made for some amazing views.
This is probably one of my favorite pictures of all time…in fact, I like it so much that I posted two versions of it (see below). It is so abstract that It looks almost unreal. It demonstrates perfectly what I was saying about the light the day I was at the North Rim.
Here is version number 2. It’s less abstract, which is what I don’t like about it, but the sky is so much prettier that I can’t resist it. So you tell me….which one is better?