Grand Canyon Facts

It snows more in the Grand Canyon than it does in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The largest underground hotel suite in the world is located 21 stories below the surface in Arizona's Grand Canyon Caverns. The Cavern Suite sits in a 345-million-year-old cave and costs $1,000 per night.

Passenger trains to the Grand Canyon stopped running in 1968. Cars had won. The tracks from Williams, Arizona sat abandoned for 20 years, torn up for scrap. Max and Thelma Biegert bought the dead line anyway. They rebuilt 65 miles of track and both depots, replacing 30,000 ties. Service relaunched on September 17, 1989, 88 years to the day after the first one. A train still leaves Williams for the South Rim every morning.

Grand Canyon's Colorado River runs 277 miles through the canyon from Lees Ferry. Inside it sits Crystal Rapid, rated 8 out of 10 on the canyon's own danger scale. A 1966 flash flood dumped rock into the river there. The park's swiftwater rescue team does not avoid that water. In one drill, they flipped a raft on purpose in Crystal Rapid, then raced the current to right it. They still train in it several times a year.

Elk at the Grand Canyon taught themselves to work the water fountains, lifting the spring-loaded levers with their noses. They guarded the spouts from hikers, and the park rebuilt the fountains elk-proof. The herds crowd the lodges anyway, to dodge cougars, so park biologists brought in a dog. Blue works on a leash and barks them back out.