Why the Grand Canyon is Meant to be Admired from Afar

In July 2009, Bryce Lee Gillies of McLean, Virginia, a physics student at Arizona State University, decided to celebrate his 20th birthday by hiking solo in the Grand Canyon.

The 5' 3", 130-pound young man decided to traverse the most stunningly beautiful loop from the North Rim down to Surprise Valley.  All his attempts to find a friend to hike with him had failed so he decided to go alone.

He parked his Subaru at the Bill Hall Trailhead and hiked without sufficient water and experience for an entire week. After getting lost, he collapsed on a boulder, face-down, dead from heatstroke and dehydration. By the time intense searches were launched and he was found, his body had turned black and bloated from the intense heat.

The 27.6-mile hike he attempted, which Backpacker Magazine had described, "This could very well be the toughest long weekend hike in Grand Canyon National Park, but you won't regret a single sunny mile," ended Gillies' life.

He typed on his Blackberry while he was dying, "Life is good whether it is long or short. I was fortunate to see more than most, and for that good fortune I am most thankful." He also typed that he believed in God but was not sure what the afterlife was like, "but I hope there is water."

He was glad that he had a Blackberry with him, otherwise it would have been hard to carve words in the rocks surrounding him, he typed. His final sentence was, "I feel like going into the wild is a calling all feel, some answer, and some die for."

One of the park rangers named Sueanne Kubicek was assigned the painful and difficult task of driving his white Subaru from the Bill Hall Trailhead and of gathering soil in a small bag, which his family had requested -- soil from where he had lived his last dream before taking his last breath.

When Sueanne opened the car door, inside was a plastic gallon jug of water, awaiting Gillies's return from the hike.

His death was among the 125 known and recorded deaths classified as "environmental." Many others who have died of environmental factors, i.e., heat stroke, dehydration, and hyponatremia (low salt in the blood due to overdrinking liquids) are not known nor recorded since the park opened in 1919. Five people were established to have died before the opening and their deaths were also included in the 125 fatalities due to environmental factors.

Note: Yet millions of unsuspected hikers were lucky to have made it alive from the Grand Canyon, some carrying their toddler children in their backpacks and lived to talk about it.