The Really Grand Canyon

Hi Kids,

     The Grand Canyon isn't the biggest or longest canyon in the world but it is the biggest one in the United States. And it is considered the most beautiful canyon anywhere. It is 277 miles long -- just a bit longer than the distance from the top to the bottom of Oklahoma.

     It was created by the Colorado River -- and erosion -- over 3 to 6 million years. If you could see through the hole in the rock in the picture below, you could see the river -- looking like a tiny thread -- about a mile down. If you look very closely, you can see people on top of that big rock.

     There are many different kinds of animals that live in the canyon. Park rangers offer talks about many of them. Here I have just enjoyed a talk about ravens. (This is a puppet in the picture, but you get the idea.) They are very large, black birds and are very smart. They can even unzip ziplock bags to get at food!
     

   
     This is me sitting on a statue of Brighty. You might want to read the book about him -- it's called Brighty of the Grand Canyon by Marguerite Henry. He was a wild burro who lived here long ago.

        I hope you enjoyed seeing my pictures. Have you been to the Grand Canyon? It's in Arizona. It was a two-and-a-half day drive from Edmond. Can you find Arizona on a map? Look at the top of the map of the state -- the Grand Canyon is sort of in the middle near the top. Do you know what direction is at the top of the map? There are lots of things to learn about travel. I want to share my adventures with you -- and I hope you get to do some traveling, too.

Your new friend,
Fuzzy

Zip-a-Dee-Do-It

It's been an age since I've blogged. I have excuses but none of them are really great. So what has driven me to try and remember how to do this? A brother who doesn't Facebook or Dropbox -- and I want to show off to.

I've long thought that a zip line would be fun but my knees would take a look at the stairs involved and convince my head that it was a bad idea. So when I found out that the zip line at Palo Duro Canyon (near Amarillo) didn't involve stairs, just a couple of bridges, I was in.

Here's what I didn't know -- the bridges were swingers with just cables to hang on to. I'll tell you right now, that was the scariest part of the whole adventure. The bridge to the take-off spot was 180 feet long. I had to just look at the platform ahead and tell myself "I'm almost there. I'm almost there" as I swayed across a chasm. I'm hoping the two videos work -- one is from the start of my zip, the other from the landing. Thanks, Jon Jarosh and Laura Watilo Blake for documenting my zip!

The zip line was about a quarter of a mile long and lasted less than a minute. The picture below is the second bridge which was 300 feet long and it was just as scary as the first. Would I do it again? You bet. But I'm looking for a zip line with an elevator.