far distance. It was hard to believe we still had another twelve hundred feet to descend.
It felt like we were in the middle of southern Arizona.
“Doesn’t feel like we’re in the Grand Canyon, does it?” Harper said excitedly. “It’s a totally different ecosystem! Keep an eye out for critters.”
“Critters?”
“Lots of chipmunks. Javelinas. All sorts of lizards, too.”
“Rattlesnakes are what you should watch out for,” Logan said.
I almost jumped out of my boots. “Rattlesnakes!”
“Yeah, there’s plenty of them too,” Harper agreed. “Look for snake holes along the side of the path. We should be fine until the sun comes up. That’s when the snakes come out to soak up the warmth.”
Once he had mentioned them, I saw snake holes everywhere. “What happens if I get bit by a rattlesnake?” I asked after a few minutes.
The three men were quiet.
“That’s not an answer!” I said.
“Let’s just say it’s better not to get bit at all,” Harper said. “We don’t want to have to airlift you out of here.”
“I like how you waited until I was already down in the canyon to mention that part.”
Harper frowned over at me. “You didn’t read up on it before coming?”
“Not everyone’s a bookworm like you,” Logan said.
“Doing my research doesn’t make me a bookworm.”
Riley nudged me in the arm. “Just don’t get bit. Let Logan lead the way and he’ll attract all the snakes.”
“I heard that.”
“I wanted you to!”
Snakes aside, the hike was downright pleasant. The view was incredible, and the relatively-flat slope and the packed dirt made it much easier to hike than the first few miles of the trail. The sun rose over the winding canyon rim to the east, bathing everything around us in orange light and warming my cheeks.
The prairie section of the canyon seemed to continue extending ahead of us, but the hiking trail descended abruptly into a smaller canyon made of black rock. The walls were steep and surrounded us oppressively, blocking the sun and making everything ten degrees colder than before. Our breathing and footsteps echoed on the narrow walls.
It was difficult to gauge distance in this new section of the canyon. I wasn’t claustrophobic but I couldn’t wait until we emerged out into the open again. Even the men were silent, like they knew not to disturb the peace of this place.
Slowly the walls widened and then we emerged. The sun hit my cheek again. Riley walked up to the edge of the path and stopped with his hands on his hips.
“I’ll never get sick of seeing that.”
I stepped next to him and gasped. There was a sudden drop-off, descending down and down and down. And a thousand feet below us was the Colorado River, flowing from my right to my left. The sound of its surge drifted up the canyon, echoing off the walls of rock.
“This is the inner canyon,” Riley explained. “There’s the south rim, the prairie, and then this.”
“The scientific term is the Precambrian Schist,” Harper said.
In any other context, this individual canyon would have been enormous. But within the Grand Canyon, it was only a small portion.
“It’s breathtaking,” I whispered. A gust of wind came howling through the canyon, whipping my jacket and hair all around.
Harper put an arm around me, steadying me on the edge. “Guess how old this part of the canyon is.”
“I don’t know. A billion years.”
It was just a number I had tossed out randomly. The biggest number I could think of. But Harper looked at me approvingly.
“The Precambrian section is between five hundred million and two billion years old. So you did do some research beforehand!”
I looked over my shoulder. I could see the south rim in the distance. “How old is the rest of the canyon?”
“A couple hundred million years old,” Logan said. “Barely old enough to get its driver’s license.”
“We ready to keep moving?” Riley asked. “We’ve still got a while to go.”
Descending the inner canyon required more switchbacks in the trail. It took us over an hour to pick our way down to the river level. After a quick pee break at the river resthouse, the trail turned parallel to the river and followed it along the canyon, a hundred feet above the roaring water.
I pointed. “What’s that?”
“The Silver Bridge,” Riley said. “That’s where we’re crossing.”
We reached the bridge a few minutes later. It was a pedestrian bridge a few hundred feet long and wide enough for just one person at a time, made of metal grating which allowed me to stare straight down at the