What Susan wants, she usually gets.

For weeks leading up to our trip to Arizona, my girlfriend Susan wanted to know why we couldn't go visit the Skywalk, the glass-bottomed walkway, while we stayed at the Grand Canyon. The Skywalk had received a lot of publicity prior to its opening.

I explained that the trip to and from the Hualapai Nation lands on the west part of the canyon's South Rim, where the Skywalk is located, would consume most of two days (it's more convenient to reach from Las Vegas). And I thought that trouble of getting there from Sedona might outweigh the vertiginous thrill and $75 charge for stepping over the canyon on glass.

Now I'm glad we didn't go, and so is Susan. Not only did the New York Times recently trash the whole experience of the walkway as no better than what one experiences from any interesting precipice overlooking the Canyon; the Times said there are better overlooks elsewhere.

Well, Susan and I (on the advice of our hiking guide) found them in the more heavily used Western areas of the south rim, including a quiet ledge that few people know about roughly a mile off the well-traveled, 22-mile-long Desert View Drive.

We also found architectural treasures designed by Mary E.J. Colter, the staff architect for the Harvey company, developer of the Canyon as a tourist site in the early 20th Century. Her masterpieces include Hopi House, just opposite El Tovar Lodge in the heart of the Grand Canyon Village, and the Desert View Watch Tower, at the east entrance to the south rim and the road to the village. Both structures interpret Native American building styles and seem to rise organically from the terrain. Several other Colter classics are in the Canyon area. What a joy not only to experience the quiet grandeur of the canyon but to see such inspired structures.

National Park Service Desert View Watch Tower.

Do Americans know Mary Colter at all? She worked hard for the integrity of her buildings. Look at these sentences from a letter she wrote in 1935 to the Chief Ranger Naturalist at the canyon, about the fireplace at the Bright Angel Lodge:

"You deserted me last winter without even a good-bye!

"…the mason is now at the Canyon with nothing to do and I'm having to pay him for lost time, so as soon as I get back Thursday morning, I'll have to get on the Lounge fireplace…

"You know I am not trying to show every strata + variation in every part of the whole Canyon—only those that occur either on the Bright Angel or the South Rim part of the Kaibab trails. I want it to be as authentic and therefore interesting as possible of course.

"Apparently we are losing out on the fossil rock for the Lobby fireplace. It is too bad for it would have been a knockout."

As Edward Rothstein points out in his story in the New York Times, the National Park Service, which operates the canyon village and structures, seems to have assumed the role of respecting and preserving the integrity of the landscape. The Hulapai, in searching for needed income, appear to have added a structure that has more to do with Disney or a thrill park.