Grand Canyon National Park

Grand Canyon National Park protects 446 km of the Colorado River's gorge in northern Arizona, a canyon up to 1.8 km deep. Most visitors come to the South Rim, open every day of the year and about 1.5 hours by road from Flagstaff, where one full day covers the main viewpoints; hikers going below the rim need two or three.

The park covers about 4,926 square kilometres of the Colorado Plateau in northern Arizona. Theodore Roosevelt, who visited in 1903, declared the canyon a national monument in 1908, and Congress made it a national park on 26 February 1919. UNESCO inscribed it as a World Heritage Site in 1979. Native American peoples, among them the Havasupai and Hualapai, have lived in and around the canyon for centuries.

The canyon walls expose rock layers reaching back to Precambrian times, stacked in bands of different colour and hardness. The Colorado River cut the gorge after the Colorado Plateau was uplifted, and side streams and erosion widened it into the maze of buttes and side canyons seen from the rim. In 1869 John Wesley Powell led the first recorded expedition down the river through the canyon, a journey that put much of it on maps for the first time.

The South Rim holds Grand Canyon Village with its historic buildings, including El Tovar Hotel of 1905 and the stone Desert View Watchtower designed by Mary Colter. Hermit Road runs west past viewpoints such as Hopi Point and Mohave Point, and Desert View Drive runs about 40 kilometres east. The Rim Trail links the main viewpoints on foot, and the Bright Angel and South Kaibab trails drop towards the river.

The North Rim stands at over 2,400 metres, higher and cooler than the South Rim, with forests and far fewer visitors. Roads close there in winter because of snow, and the 2025 Dragon Bravo Fire destroyed the historic Grand Canyon Lodge and other buildings. Phantom Ranch, a lodge on the canyon floor, is reached on foot, by mule or by raft.

Entry fees are paid per vehicle or per person at the park gates or online, with an additional surcharge for nonresident visitors. Sunrise and sunset bring the strongest colour on the canyon walls, and early mornings are best for hiking before the summer heat. Never try to hike to the river and back in one day in summer; temperatures at the bottom often pass 40 degrees Celsius. One full day covers the South Rim viewpoints.

The South Entrance on AZ-64 is about an hour from Williams, 3.5 hours from Phoenix and 4.5 hours from Las Vegas. The Grand Canyon Railway runs daily from Williams into Grand Canyon Village, and Groome Transportation shuttles connect Flagstaff and Phoenix airport with the park. Much of the Rim Trail is paved and level, the free park shuttles are wheelchair accessible, and an accessibility permit opens some restricted roads to private vehicles. Arizona stays on Mountain Standard Time all year, so sunrise and sunset times do not shift with daylight saving.

The North Rim reopened on 15 May 2026 after the 2025 Dragon Bravo Fire, with phased access and very limited services. The National Park Service lists it as open through 30 November 2026 or the first major snowstorm. The North Rim Campground, general store and gas station have already closed for the season, there is no lodging inside the park on that side, and fuel is sold at Jacob Lake. The North Kaibab Trail and Phantom Ranch are closed after flash flooding, with no reopening date.