Depth perception

A popular tourist feature at the south rim of Black Canyon National Park is Chasm overlook. Across the canyon is a railing that protects sightseers from taking a fatal step off the north rim. From where I stood, not even a quarter mile of thin air separated us, but the 2,000-foot plummet in between contained all the encouragement I needed to just smile and wave. 

President Clinton upgraded the Black Canyon by designating it as a national park in 1999, 66 years after President Herbert Hoover first declared it a national monument. I asked a friend of mine, a retired Park Service superintendent, What’s the difference? He told me that generally national monuments have a single natural feature that attracts visitors, whereas a national park contains more than just one. I see, I said, but I didn’t. He must have sensed my confusion, so he added: Mostly it’s just politics.   

Though the Black is a grand canyon, it’s not The Grand Canyon, which made me happy. I could be accused of comparing bell peppers to watermelons, but for me an attraction becomes less attractive when nearly 5 million visitors stop by annually to look over the edge and say Wow. To visit the Black Canyon a person really has to want to go there.  It’s not just a detour to a colossal dip in the road while traveling to or from Disneyland. It requires some backroad planning.

Standing at the precipice, I heard the Black Canyon calling to me, subliminally, from beneath the river’s roar.  Thankfully none of it sounded like a suggestion to jump. I had never been to the north side, and it beckoned me to cross.  In the 30 years I’ve lived in Colorado, I’ve only visited this national park once. For me, time is trickling away. For the canyon, where a billion-year-old precambrian tooth glistened in a slip of sunlight near the bottom, time is not such a big deal.  

Or it could be those folks waving from the north rim who inspired me. No bridge to span the canyon has ever been built in the park’s history, and thankfully imagination always falls short, so a drive to the other side seemed the only way. The park brochure recommended allotting two hours for the trip.  I’d brought a bicycle and for a moment pedaling the circuit crossed my mind, but only for a moment. 

The first and only other time I visited the Black Canyon, I took the East Portal down to the river, a 16 percent grade in places, with hairpin turns that prohibit most trailers and RVs from taking the plunge. I thought of staying in the campground at the bottom of the world, but I also like to wake when the first light of sunrise comes peeking over the horizon. Down there, it might be closer to noon before I had any inkling the day had dawned. Instead, I stuck my toes in the cold water and returned to the rim.

The road along the north rim twists like black licorice, and the view is sweet. Though the way is narrow, it’s not as harrowing as the canyon itself. I pulled in at every available vantage point for a look and a photograph. You see, there’s nothing so inspiring as depth. We scratch the surface for most of the days of our lives. If we get the chance to look over the edge, we should not forget to take a deep breath and be inspired.

I was surprised to learn Robert Frost’s roots make him a westerner, for he was born in California, but he is known as a rural New England poet. At the age of 11, he moved to Massachusetts to live in his grandfather’s house following his father’s sudden death. His geography changed, and a rift in his young life altered his perspective. Had he grown up in his native West, I believe his famous poem,” Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” would never have seen any snow and ended something like this:

...these canyons are lovely, dark and deep,

but I have promises to keep,

and miles to go before I sleep,

and miles to go before I sleep.

As I finally made the trip to the north rim, that verse echoed in my brain like a song that you heard somewhere and can’t stop humming. 

Over four hours later – not the prescribed two – I came full circle, back to the Chasm overlook where I had started, my odometer having clocked 185 miles. The evening shadows had just started their descent to the canyon floor. All I had energy left to do was make my way to the south rim campground and open a cold beer. Lucky for me, I hadn’t made any other promises.

– David Feela