Because Antelope Canyon is on Navajo land, you must pay a Navajo Nation fee to visit it, and you must go with a Navajo guide. There is an upper canyon and a lower canyon, and each requires a guide. We were unsure which one to visit. Our Navajo host at the campground suggested the upper canyon, and a particular company. So, not knowing any better (I think it must have been his cousins or something), we bought tickets for an afternoon tour. Later in the morning, when we were lost and asked for help, another Navajo suggested the lower canyon, and a particular company. We ended up doing both, and we had wildly different experiences.
For our visit to the lower canyon, we went on foot with a young woman who was very open and friendly. She told us a lot about the canyon and its meaning to the Navajo people, and even a little bit about herself and her culture. There was only one other couple on our tour, and their English was limited. So we really had a quiet, and respectful, and wonderful, time inside what is one of the most amazing environments you can imagine. It felt very close to holy. It was made more so by the fact that somewhere inside the canyon, someone was playing a flute. It was quite wonderful, and seemed well worth the time, the money, and the effort. I will count it as one of the most beautiful and awe-inspiring places I have been.
It is impossible to describe. And the pictures, especially from a cell phone, just can't even begin to illustrate it. The camera picks up some of the different minerals in the rock, so some of the colors look brighter in their differences than it looks in real life. Still, it is a more or less realistic portrayal of what you see.
Here are a few, to give you an idea.
Inside the Canyon
This is just looking up, from the floor of the canyon
This gives you an idea of the amazing shapes you see as you walk in the canyon
Doesn't this look like it is generated by a computer? But this is what it looks like!
This gives you an idea of how narrow the passages are. Sometimes you have to turn sideways to squeeze through.
The curves and patterns just go on and on. It is impossible not to feel shocked to see it
The camera picks up some different colors in the rocks. But the shapes, and the light, are there.
I couldn't stop taking pictures, and it is hard to pick which ones to post here
To get into the canyon, you have to walk down a few of these. Some are very steep.
At the end of the walk through the canyon, there were steps to go back up again
We had already paid for the second tour, and would lose our money if we didn't go.....so, off we went, in spite of a feeling that the second tour would be unlikely to be as nice. And...it wasn't. First off, they take vans of 15 people at a time (and four vans of 15 left with us), and after a half an hour ride, they herd you through the canyon, as if you were on kind of a conveyor belt. They tell you to take this picture, then that one. Take that one, and move along. There were so many people in the canyon it was almost impossible to get a picture that didn't have a crowd of people in it. It was rushed, it was crowded, and it was loud. It made me feel like crying, in spite of how beautiful it is.
I suppose if we hadn't had the other kind of tour, we would have been dazzled by the beauty of the canyon and wouldn't have felt so sad. As it was, I kept thinking that if the Federal Government had authority over this place, and they treated it like that, the Navajos would have said they were desecrating their sacred space. But it was the Navajos themselves. It was so sad. It was capitalism at its worst, and in a place that felt sacred.
BUT......this Antelope Canyon is one of the most amazing places I have ever been in my life. The canyon is so tight, that in many places it was barely wide enough to put down your shoe to walk forward. And the gold color when the sun was behind the rocks was DAZZLING. It is just an astonishing place on this earth. I only wish the pictures could show it like it really is.
Also in the Page area is another astonishing thing to see.
This is the Horseshoe Bend in the Colorado River.
This is the landscape at the edge, near the bend in the river. For perspective, that is Bob standing at the overlook.
This was another place in the Page area that is impossible to convey with cell phone pictures. The Colorado River takes a dramatic bend in this spot, and it has created an amazing "island" in the middle of its bend. It is so dramatically far down to the river, and such a surprise to look over the edge (very easy to get terrifyingly close) and see it. It is also one of the most satisfying walks we have taken. It is less than a mile walk to reach this spot. And, without the intense summer heat, there was really no suffering involved in getting there. It was wonderful! Well worth the side trip. It turned out that Page was a little off our track towards the south rim of the Grand Canyon. But I'm so delighted that we went.
The Glen Canyon Dam is there as well. When you spend a lot of time in this part of the country, you discover the good things and the not so good things about "progress." For instance, the town of Page didn't really exist until the Glen Canyon dam was built. Before the dam was built, the Colorado River was wild and untamed. It flooded on its own terms, and eroded or filled up the various canyons. It was not navigable, and truly, it just did what it wanted. The dam created Lake Powell, the second largest man made lake in the US. It created hydroelectric power for an enormous area in the southwest. It turned the area into a place where there are many recreational activities that would not have been possible before. It also completely changed the river and the ecosystem of the entire area, including the Grand Canyon. It is, like most things that are called "progress," very complicated. The dam itself is pretty cool to visit, and we enjoyed a walk to an overlook to look at it.
The Glen Canyon Dam
And next, last but certainly not least, on to the great granddaddy of them all...the Grand Canyon.
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