Gallery (45 images): 2019 Grand Canyon Trip - The Canyon!
This, finally, was the ultimate reason for our trip, the main event. My mom and dad had, on two separate trips, driven down to the Southwest and visited the Grand Canyon, and both times it was socked in with clouds so thick that you couldn't even see the canyon at all. So this was on my dad's bucket list, the wish to see the Grand Canyon in all its glory. The evening we arrived, it was overcast and raining, and the next morning didn't look all that promising either, but after we had breakfast it started to clear...
The passing storm had done a fantastic job of cleaning the air of dust and the views were the clearest I'd ever seen at the Grand Canyon myself. I had been there maybe three or four times previously, but the clarity this time was outstanding. To make things more interesting, a midday storm decided to scour the air even further and later that evening the views were, if anything, even better than in the morning. We had lucked out and had a day of gorgeous weather, absolutely fantastic for taking photos!
We were hoping to take in some more views again the next morning, but alas it was not to be: in fact, we had extremely poor visibility in blizzard like conditions on the drive east out of the park! The one day we were there, the weather was fantastic but the day prior and the day after, terrible weather with virtually no visibility into the canyon. Indeed, Lady Luck had smiled upon us that day for sure!
To get a good sense of just how vast the Grand Canyon really is, click on image #33 in the above linked gallery and then open the larger 3000 pixel wide version. Find the person standing near the edge of the cliff near the upper right of the shot...
Sadly, my mother passed away in 2008 and never did get to see the canyon like this in person. Neither did my dad's more recent companion Franziska unfortunately, who suddenly passed away in 2018. She too really wanted to see the Grand Canyon in person and the three of us had actually planned on doing this trip in 2017. Unlike my mother, Franziska had never been to the US Southwest at all. However that year, my dad had some serious health issues and couldn't really travel, nor could he get medical insurance for travel outside of Canada, so we had decided to postpone this trip until after our planned trip to Germany in 2018. Since Franziska sadly passed away early last year, my dad and I ended up traveling to Germany on our own as well.
Link to: All the blog posts from my 2019 Grand Canyon Trip
Below are a few stitched panoramic shots, a little too wide to look good in the main gallery, although not as wide as some I had posted previously. Since I couldn't decide on just one, the last three are similar versions of the same view, shot with different lenses at slightly different times. Click on the image to open a larger view in a new window or tab...
0 comments:
Post a Comment