Wow. Just... wow. The Grand Canyon is just as magestic as its name suggests. It's very breathtaking, just a vast chasm, carved out over thousands of years, roxk formations towering over 5,000 feet high. The only thing that threw my, scenery-wise, was the colours. I'm used to nature meaning GREEN, all shades of jade and kelp and emeral and olive and lime. But, this is different. Nevada and Arizona are deserts, and the terrain is harsh with russet-red and brick and tawny and ochre and henna. It's an alien world for a person like me. All of this is alien.
The only two things that threw me, not scenery-wise, for the rest of the day was the intense, arid, dusty heat, and my terrible vertigo. Just some numbers on the heat - It was 110o Farenheit... in the shade, closer to 120oF in the sun. I had a uncumfortably close brush with disaster by nearly fainting within two feet of the canyon's edge. I have to get over this "feeling faint" lark. It's really quite annoying. You see, there are no railings or fences or warning signs... just rock, and then death. It's painful, this level of heat. You can feel your skin charring under these harsh rays, and any amount of movement or exertion drains you nearly immediately, and your lips dry and crack until they bleed. No amount of water quenches a ravenous thirst, and you feel like your skin is shrinking around your bones. And, there is the dust, a thick dust, full of iron, that covers everything in a blanket of rusty red. It gets in your lungs and your hair and your clothes, it coats your skin and parches your mouth. It's swirled by the blisteringly hot desert winds, and worsens the feeling of dehydration and heat.
With the vertigo? Forgive my fear and weakness, but we were over 4000 feet (1,219.2 metres) above the Canyon floor, and, like I said, there are no safety rails, and the ground slopes toward the edges at every direction. One false move on the unstable shale, and you're history, and not the first one. There have been plenty of people who have fallen to their deaths - at least three a year.
But, my parents had arranged for us all to go on the SkyWalk. Ya know, that huge, glass horseshoe haning in mid-air over the edge of the cliff? I was really excited to go, not scared at all to start with, and even had the gall to laugh at the booties we have to wear to protect the glass floor. But, as soon as I took about 8 steps onto the glass, and looked down through this flimsy-looking, clear material to see eagles that are actually massive looking the size of pinheads as they rode the thermals 3000 feet below me, and helicopters that looked no bigger than dragonflies, and the ground just falling away beneath me, with rocky outcroppings and cracks in the cliff face and sheer drops of farther than my mind can even comprehend.... I have never been that terrified in a long time, not with that in-the-moment, I-am-in-danger, full-fledged-panic-attack, deer-in-the-headlights response. I quite literally could not move. My legs were so weak that I thought I was going to collapse onto the glass, and my brain would not think logical, coherant thoughts, and my mouth and throat went dry(er). I felt physically sick, and lost about a gallon of precious water through crying. I. Just. Froze. And, it's one-way around the horseshoe. I had to go right out onto the glass, right the way around, to get both feet back on terrafirma. I did it, eventually, but I think it was made easier by the fact that my tears blurred the sight of the ground so far below me. Cheating, maybe, but effective.
I redeemed myself slightly later by being able to clamber up the side of this tower of rock up to a look-out point that was quite high up. It was very difficult. Not the climbing; I can handle that. But, the looking around and seeing sheer drops on every side as you climb higher and higher and higher above sea-level. THAT gets to me.
But, it annoys the heck out of me. The shale heap I climbed was far less stable than the SkyWalk, and we didn't have to pay for it. Couldn't I have chickened out on that instead, and not cost my parents a fortune??? Besides, it was the one reason we came to the cursed place - Dad was desperate to see the SkyWalk, and I wrecked it for him and rest of my family by breaking down in tears and refusing to let go of the railing. So much for channeling the personalities of fearless heros and heroines in the adverntures and crime novels I read, or the characters I create for the stories I write myself. Maybe I will just stay strictly suburban and pathetic, and perhaps interview people on occasion, and leave the exploring to them. I'm obviously not cut out for a life of soaring above my troubles. Actually, looking back, this post has been quite negative. Case in point.
I have to go. We're back in the ritz Elcalibur, and I'm getting red dust over their nice, plush chairs and fancy, patterned carpets. Not very ladylike of me....
Still very much grounded in reality,
Rachel
No comments:
Post a Comment