"The Grand Canyon of Colorado is a chasm that slices through the plateau country of northern Arizona like a gigantic and impossible desert crevasse." Part 1, Chap. 1, p. 3

"It happened quite unexpectedly, the way the big moments often do." Part 2, Chap. 1, p. 5

"I do not think I ever really considered that things might go seriously wrong." Part 2, Chap. 1, p. 12

"Soon I was feeling grateful too for the familiar rewards of simple living - for the cleansing primitive habits and precautions." Part 3, Chap.1, p. 17

"No one, it seemed, had ever attempted the Gorge on foot." Part 3, Chap. 2, p. 30

"The discovery of this airy and open and quite unexpected world left me feeling surprisingly well informed about what I could expect to find during the week that lay ahead." Part 3, Chap. 4, p. 56

"Partly because of this doubt (and partly because the second day out nearly always seems the hardest on feet...