Not quite a walk in the park

The subtitle of Kevin Fedarko's A Walk in the Park is somewhat misleading: "The True Story of a Spectacular Misadventure in the Grand Canyon."

True, Fedarko and his good friend Pete McBride were badly—almost fatally—unprepared to walk the length of the Grand Canyon, all 277 miles. They had to be extracted from the canyon twice because to continue further probably would have killed them. Only because they were helped by kind and generous—and experienced (don't forget experienced)—hikers did they survive.

The canyon is laced with trails that Native Americas made hundreds, a thousand years ago or more. Indeed, only when John Wesley Powell spotted a trail leading from the river to the rim in 1876 on the first white person's running of the Colorado River through the canyon did he realize it was not an untouched wilderness. There is however no trail that you can walk from end of the Canyon to the other.

A Walk in the Park is a delightful book, "part memoir, part travelogue, part extended essay on the profound meanings of wilderness." The writing is marvelous and it provoked strong writing from readers on Amazon: "Fedarko combines deep history, personal story, friendship, family, sacrifice, sensitivity to Indigenous rights, understanding of recent history, environmental observation with an adventure that belies belief. The writing is perfect, with moments of sheer lyricism on top of sheer terror." I couldn't have said it better.

Although the Grand Canyon has several dozen recognized (by the National Park Service) trails, there is no path from one end of the Canyon to the other. Fedarko and McBride did manage to walk the entire length of the Canyon, from Lee's Ferry virtually to Lake Mead without one but with considerable help. They did walk in heat and they walked in snow. They rappeled down slot canyon walls and climbed cliffs. It took them a year to complete the trip with periods of recovery between stretches in the Canyon. 

A dip in Havasu Creek near its
confluence with the Colorado

A dozen years ago I went down the river on a raft. A friend won the lottery for a permit and organized a trip for sixteen friends and friends of friends who could take sixteen days to camp along the river. (The NPS has only 482 permits for non-commercial trips down the river in 2025.) Because ours was a private trip, we were free from any commercial restraints, but we had to do everything ourselves. I'd been told it would be the trip of a lifetime and it was.

And having spent sixteen days at the bottom of the canyon and hiked into side canyons (I almost lost a river sandal at the confluence of the Little Colorado where Powell spotted the trail to the rim), I am in awe of Fedarko's and McBride's accomplishment. They were not the first, as Fedarko acknowledges, but more people have walked on the moon than have walked the length of the Grand Canyon.

But you do not have to have gone down the Colorado to appreciate and enjoy the book. Again, another reader says it best: "You will discover a radiantly written, compelling story of a nearly 800 mile plunge into and hike through the intricacies of the Grand Canyon. You will join an astounding odyssey through one of earth’s holy and sacred wonders." If you can't go down the river or visit the Canyon, A Walk in the Park is the next best thing.