NOT JUST ANY OLD PLACE

ANY OLD PLACE

Although Grand Canyon National Park is turning 100 this month, the natural wonder for which it's named is a bit older — about 35 million years or more. There are other big, old canyons in the world, including Tsangpo Canyon in Tibet, but there's no canyon on Earth as beautiful as ours.

A PORTFOLIO EDITED BY JEFF KIDA “One might imagine that [the Grand Canyon] was intended for the library of the gods, and so it was. The shelves are not for books ... but form the stony leaves of one great book.”“He who would read the language of the universe may dig out letters here and there, and with them spell words and read ... in a slow and imperfect way, but still so as to understand a little, the story of creation.” “The glories and the beauties of form, color, and sound unite in the Grand Canyon — forms unrivaled even by the mountains, colors that vie with sunsets, and sounds that span the diapason from tempest to tinkling raindrop, from cataract to bubbling fountain.” “You cannot see the Grand Canyon in one view, as if it were a changeless spectacle from which a curtain might be lifted, but to see it you have to toil from month to month through its labyrinths. It is a region more difficult to traverse than the Alps or the Himalayas, but if strength and courage are sufficient for the task, by a year's toil a concept of sublimity can be obtained never again to be equaled on the hither side of Paradise.”

"IT'S NOT WHAT YOU LOOK AT THAT MATTERS. IT'S WHAT YOU SEE."

Lipan Point, on the South Rim, offers an early-morning panorama of the Canyon's buttes and the Colorado River. This overlook is just west of Desert View Watchtower.

"TWENTY YEARS FROM NOW YOU WILL BE MORE DISAPPOINTED BY THE THINGS YOU DIDN'T DO THAN BY THE ONES YOU DID DO."

A small waterfall trickles into Saddle Canyon, a tributary of Marble Canyon, in the northeastern part of the park. This spot is near Mile 47 on the Colorado River. Adam Schallau

Textures emerge in a section of Brahma schist, one of the Grand Canyon's oldest rock types, Exposed in the Inner Gorge, Brahma schist is about 1.75 billion years old. Wes Timmerman

Deer Creek Falls feeds hanging greenery as it empties into the Colorado River near river Mile 137. Most commercial and private Canyon rafting trips stop at the 150-foot waterfall. Derek von Briesen