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  • Day 11

    The GRAND CANYON

    October 18, 2018 in the United States ⋅ 🌙 10 °C

    Those few of you who took the effort to sign up and follow our blog, despite the many invitations sent out not only are you fine folk but I know you are smart buggars too so we’re sure you heard of or seen David Hockney’s ( too late to Google it now Nick) painting A Bigger Grand Canyon in the National Gallery of Australia.

    There are some great attempts at having a crack at this place by many artists but really not much hope when even our photos don’t deliver on describing the magnificence of it all.
    On story boards around the rim there are quotes from all those old bastards who first saw the place and even in their ancient flowery writings they don’t hit the mark either.

    What is it with those old people, they were supposed to be uneducated yet all wrote like Shakespeare, even the local “smithy” could whack out a decent bit of prose even if he was just saying “actually the shoes are fine it’s just your horse that’s worn out”. Today everyone’s supposed to be so educated yet few can rub two syllables together.
    Another thing too those ancient explorers knew how to put an expedition together. The first group of Spaniards to venture here from Mexico had as well as all the essential members took four priests in their party. Four! what’s that all about, you either know what you are doing or you pray, I reckon the former is the go, make sure you read the book “Exploring For Dummies” first then it should all go well.

    This advice should have been taken along time ago because apparently the party was sent out to look for five or so cities of gold and when they returned to Mexico having failed the cranky ruler cut off their heads. At this stage those four priests could have come in handy.
    Little did they realise that this bit of overachieving erosion here was worth far mor than any golden city as all you had to do was to stick a toll booth at the front and hold out your hand.

    The altitude here 7,000ft plateau makes it a cold place in winter, we are approaching it now and so last night it snowed.
    In respect to those poor headless Spaniards rather than pay exorbitant prices for an overcrowded campground we drove a few miles out into the state forest where you are allowed to camp and light a fire for free.

    Despite the sound of gunshots all around, this is Arizona after all, it was a peaceful place, so what if a few bullets whistle over your head at least it’s better than being surrounded by campers.
    It’s under tall pines with plenty of wood lying around so we were determined to have a fire no matter how cold it was getting, just forget about the warm RV with its furnace and all the comforts we can have a fire out here for free.
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