Bright Angel Trail, Grand Canyon of the Colorado, Arizona
The tourist who visits the Grand Canyon of the Colorado would want first to see the canyon (kn´ yn) from its rim. If he could get a bird's eye view of it, it would be still better. He would see 400 miles of canyon zigzagging across an almost treeless plain. And over a mile below, at the bottom of the gorge, he would see the Colorado River. The River looks like a silver thread winding its way through the many-colored rocks. He might spend days on the rim of the canyon, visiting various points of interest-Grand View, Shoshone Point, Yuma Point, Hermit Rim, Sentinel Point, and many others. Then the tourist would want to visit the depths of the canyon. The view here shows one of the trails to the bottom. This is Bright Angel Trail. There are three other paths leading down into the canyon. You can imagine that these trails are steep and rugged, when you remember that it is over a mile from the rim of the canyon to its bottom, where the Colorado flows. The other three trails are Hermit Trail, Bass Trail, and Grand View. The journey is made on the backs of mules. By way of the Bright Angel Trail the trip is about 7 miles. It takes 3 hours to go down and about 3½ hours to make the return journey. At some points on the trail, the riders can look over the edge of the precipice and see straight down a distance of several thousands of feet. It is about 4,000 feet high from the lowest place you see, to the plateau level shown in the background where the earth and sky seem to meet. The Colorado lies 1,000 feet below, the lowest point in the scene. That is, the distance from the bottom of the canyon to the top at this point is about 5,000 feet. Keystone ID: 13600 Note: All titles, descriptions, and location coordinates are from the original Keystone Slide documentation as supplied by the Keystone View Company. No text has been edited or changed.