"Man clings to the edge of eternity." "Our passion to know propels us to the stars but we are humbled by the secrets of the earth." "Is this great canyon the work of God or a symphony of nature?" "Is it the summation of all grandeur or the grave of the world?" "The fragile human history of Grand Canyon begins 4,000 years ago." "Their beginnings are lost in time." "Only the shadow of their lives and superstitions are left to whisper of their homes along the rim." "We know them only as "the gatherers"." "In a time lost to history, man entered the unknown depth of Grand Canyon." "Some sought refuge from the hostile nomads of the northern deserts." "Others came to grow their crops on the sheltered canyon floor." "Man had come... but he would not stay." "He would pass in oblivious silence beneath walls that have watched 10,000 centuries slip away." "Remnants of these ancient travelers are scattered across 2,000 years and yet we know them not at all." "Who were these Anasazi, these ancient ones whose baked bricks built mud houses in the sheltered hollows of the canyon?" "Where was their beginning?" "The mystery of the Anasazi is shrouded in the legends of 4,000 years and yet his presence here is but a tiny line on the rim of history." "And then he was gone." "Less than 50 years after Columbus discovered America" "Don Garcia Lopez de Cardenas and a small band of Spanish explorers traveled north in search of the fabled lost cities of gold." "The year is 1540." "What did you see?" "We arrived..." "Follow me." "Let's go!" "Go!" "Go!" "It was 300 years before James Ohio Pattie and a band of French trappers encountered the north rim of Grand Canyon." "It is 1826." "His claims of discovery echoed ignorant disregard for the people already there." "Tall tales of Indians, lost silver mines and legends of Spanish gold rose like a mist from the black granite gorge of the unknown chasm." "The myth and mystery beckoned the bold in heart." "The quest to discover the hidden secrets of Grand Canyon had begun." "Tyrell!" "Tyrell?" "What?" "Are you sure this here's the right river?" "You betcha." "Don't let her drift!" "Bring her around, son!" "Yee-ha!" "This ain't the right river." "Major John Wesley Powell challenged the 217 miles of unexplored canyon in 1869." "This one-armed veteran of the Civil War and his intrepid crew became the first to do what no man had ever done." "We shrank with the river into insignificance." "Though more violent than the sea, the waves are puny ripples against the majesty of the cliffs that rise to the world above." "We are but pygmies lost among the boulders." "The river turned sharply east and seemed enclosed by a wall set with a million brilliant gems." "Fountains burst from the rock overhead and the spray and the sunshine form the gems of light that bedecked the walls." "The rocks were covered with moss and fern and flowers." "I'm determined to call it "Vacy's Paradise."" "What do you think, old-timer?" "Sure is something." "Yeah." "The scenery now is on a grand scale." "The walls of the canyon are 2,500 feet above us." "One would imagine the walls had been carved with a grand design and purpose and always we wonder what we shall find tomorrow." "The exploration was made for scientific purpose, not adventure, and yet, ever before us there was unknown danger that weighs heavier upon us than any immediate peril." "But our fears are cradled by the stunning beauty of the countless hidden canyons." "We advance through the mysterious canyon with some anxiety." "The old mountaineers have told us it cannot be run." "The Indians have warned us not to try." "The sun is going down." "The vermilion gleams and roseate hues blend with the green and gray and slowly change to somber brown above and black shadows creep over them below." "It took Powell's expedition 79 days to reach the unexplored inner gorge of Grand Canyon." "One boat and one man were gone." "Their strength, food and courage were nearly exhausted... and they had only begun." "Tomorrow we start our way down the great unknown." "We have an unknown distance to run, an unknown river to explore." "It is with anxiety and misgiving that we enter the canyon below." "What falls there be, we know not." "What walls be set the canyon, we know not." "What rapids or dangers or treacherous disaster awaits us, we know not." "But press on." "God willing!" "Falls!" "Falls!" "Grab the line on the other side!" "Hurry!" "Hurry!" "Although anxious to advance, we are determined to run with great caution." "Least by another accident, we lose our remaining supplies." "That's it, right there." "Okay, now turn it around." "Those who were boys in our enterprise are mostly dead or living gray with age but their bronzed, brave, hardy faces come before me as they appeared in the vigor of life." "Their live, powerful forms seem to move around me." "Hey, hey!" "Come on!" "The memory of those men and their heroic deeds shall live forever." "Captain Howland has determined to abandon the river." "He entreats us it is madness to attempt the rapids before us." "It is a solemn parting." "Tears are shed." "Each party thinks the other is taking the more dangerous course." "To say there is part of the canyon I can not explore is more than I am willing to acknowledge." "I'm determined to go on!" "Howland and the men who left us were never seen again." "That rapid was our last." "The danger was over." "The gloom had disappeared." "But what of those men?" "Most say they were killed by Indians." "I wonder..." "The secret of their fate lies hidden, perhaps forever." "The timeless forces of the canyon ignore and defy the faint shadow of man's influence, but his presence is felt." "And some things can never be the same again." "The human quest to conquer and possess began a new chapter in the history of Grand Canyon." "John Hiller, the first to seriously photograph the canyon began what no one could ever finish." "The canyon challenges and then defies man's passion to capture and communicate." "No picture or word, no brush or palette, no lens or paint can extend the wonder of Grand Canyon beyond itself." "There is no time here." "Only the endless cycles of life chronicle the passing millennia." "Man passes in a whisper, a mere breath at the edge of eternity." "Some live, some die." "Some just disappear." "Some will live forever and speak in muted silence from the dust." "From above, the Grand Canyon appears inanimate and dead, but she is alive with the creatures which survived with her, their journey of a million years." "It's only on the tiny trailing edge of time that man has been able to share the magnificent perspective of the birds." "Our ability to fly has forever changed our relationship with Grand Canyon." "We have penetrated the barriers that have isolated and protected her for our 4,000 years together." "Flight has brought us to the final threshold of the hidden secrets, but the deepest questions remain unanswered." "The canyon has no need of man but mankind will face a moment in eternity when he may have a fundamental need to experience the character and timeless perspective that makes this such a wondrous place." "And as we struggle to comprehend we may discover a consciousness of our own immortality, a vague and distant sense of the divine, making us one with each other and uniting us in peace with the infinite."