I’m in Arizona on assignment. My travel, minus your typical out of pocket costs — snacks, fuel, that Negro Modelo I had with enchiladas, etc. — were paid for by Arizona Tourism.
“In the Grand Canyon, Arizona has a natural wonder which is in kind absolutely unparalleled throughout the rest of the world. I want to ask you to keep this great wonder of nature as it now is. I hope you will not have a building of any kind, not a summer cottage, a hotel or anything else, to mar the wonderful grandeur, the sublimity, the great loneliness and beauty of the canyon. Leave it as it is. You cannot improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it.”
— Theodore Roosevelt
I haven’t been to all of the National Parks — there are many in the Southwest that still elude me and the East Coast, well, I’ve not been far beyond the East slope of the Rockies. I did get to visit Teddy Roosevelt National Park a few years back, and Mount Rushmore, and it was in those places that I decided that complicated or no, as far as presidents go, Teddy Roosevelt is my man.
It’s the parks. What a spectacular gift it was to America, TR’s ability to recognize these places as special and to set them aside for, well, me, nearly 100 years ago. Not just for me, but for visitors from all over the world.
The crowds at the Grand Canyon could be a little intense at times; I imagine TR would freak out to see them lined up at the shuttle bus stops, or weirder still, carrying their plastic trays to the tables in the cafeteria at Maswik Lodge, but the wonder spilling past the lips of everyone standing at the rail, gawking wide-eyed across that giant red gold expanse feels undiluted by time.
Great photos… TR rocks!