What's fast becoming a frightening number of years ago, I was a geography student. Whenever I tell people this for the first time, their first reaction is normally to laugh and then either ask if I'm any good at colouring in or how much I know about oxbow lakes (seriously, those questions never get old...). Though my geography love has always been firmly based in the human geography camp, I really do love the great outdoors and being surrounded by natural beauty, which I think has a lot to do with growing up by the sea.
Anyway, when we decided to make the trip to Las Vegas, perhaps embarrassingly it wasn't the prospect of the casinos, luxury hotels or incredible nightlife that excited me most...it was the fact that I might actually get to visit the Grand Canyon. And (geek alert) the Hoover Dam, the subject of many a good GCSE Geography exam paper!
It turns out, the Grand Canyon is FAR from Las Vegas. Like, a five hour drive far (hey, I never claimed to be any good at reading maps...). And helicopter trips are expensive (plus, as a not-so-great flyer, helicopters sort of terrify me). So, at one point, I started to resign myself to the fact that we wouldn't actually get to make the trip. Mr. O however is much more logical than I am. We were so close! We both wanted to go! And who on earth turns down the opportunity to visit the GRAND CANYON for goodness sake!? It was possibly a once-in-a-lifetime chance, so, after a bit of research, we found the perfect option for us.
Instead of a helicopter, we would take an aeroplane tour to the canyon, arriving early and having it pretty much to ourselves, leaving just before the arrival of the hordes of visitors who travel by coach. Not the cheapest option, but money we felt would be worth spending, buying us back the time we'd have otherwise spent on board a coach ourselves. Taking an early morning tour would also mean we'd avoid being at the canyon in the full heat of the day, something we were later very glad of!
Dragged from my bed at 6:00 the next morning, we were up and out, breakfast muffins in hand, ready to be collected at 6:30. We were whisked off to Maverick Airlines' base in Henderson, just outside of Las Vegas, where we were soon introduced to our pilot, Derek, and welcomed aboard the plane that would take us to the canyon. Captain Derek gave us a great commentary along the way, pointing out the sites and making sure we all had a great view as were passed by the Hoover Dam (whoop whoop!).
After 40 minutes, we touched down on the West Rim of the Grand Canyon, ready to spend the next three hours exploring. The lovely thing about the trip was that from this point on, it wasn't guided. We were free to explore the surrounding area as we wanted, wandering, climbing and hiking our way to increasingly awesome views. This was truly a breathtaking experience - one of those mornings that will stay with us both for as long as we live. Surrounded by such a vast, incredible natural phenomenon, the scale of which we couldn't even begin to capture in pictures (though we gave it our best shots!), was so very moving. It made me feel like such a small cog in this massive, beautiful world, but also truly grateful for all that I have and for the chance to count my blessings hand in hand with Mr. O.
We stood and watched and soaked it all in for as long as we could. Then we jumped back on our little plane and headed back to the bright lights of the Strip, the complete polar opposite of the natural beauty we were leaving behind. We were home in time for an afternoon by pool...bizarre.
Maverick Aviation Group, 6075 S. Las Vegas Blvd, Las Vegas, Nevada 89119
Note: We decided not to bother paying extra to visit the Skywalk - and we really didn't feel like we'd missed out once we saw it either.
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