I was in Las Vegas when I decided to take a detour into a different kind of spectacle. A few hours away from neon lights and desert casinos lies a landscape so vast and humbling that it makes even the brightest city feel fleeting: the Grand Canyon. First Glimpse of Immensity The first sight of the canyon is staggering. A sudden drop reveals 277 miles of stone, averaging 10 miles wide, plunging more than a mile deep. The Colorado River snakes through the bottom, glinting like a ribbon of copper. It seems improbable that such a slender river carved this colossus, yet it did—slowly, with a patience beyond human time. It seems improbable that such a slender river carved this colossus, yet it did—slowly, with a patience beyond human time. Reading Earth’s Long Story At the rim, the canyon is more than scenery—it is a revelation. Nearly two billion years of geology are exposed in its walls, each layer a page in Earth’s chronicle: seas that rose and vanished, sand dunes hardened into stone, ...