The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy has this to say about space.
“Space,” it says, “is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mindbogglingly big it is. I mean you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to space. Listen…” and so on.
You can apply pretty much the same wording to the Grand Canyon.
The photos don’t tell the whole story. You sort of have to be there. But hopefully looking at the photos will give you a better sense of the scale, the ancientness, of it better than any description I could offer.
I spent three days on the South Rim. It’s totally different from the other parks I’ve visited. There, the emphasis was on preserving the archaeological sites the parks encompass. Providing for visitor comfort was a secondary concern. Everything at the rim of the Grand Canyon, though, is totally focused on the millions of tourists who visit the park every year. Shuttle buses, paved trails, the whole nine yards. Not to say that’s necessarily a bad thing — just different from sites like Chaco or Mesa Verde (especially Chaco, where they’d be just as happy if you weren’t there to disturb the ruins). After all, you get to meet more people this way, and Mather Village does boast the nicest general store that has ever existed. (A lot of grocery stores in developed cities would cry if they saw this one.) It’s downright civilized.