GRAND CANYON WEST: An Indian view of the famous gorge
Story-Date: 02:53 a.m. PST Sunday   , October 11, 1998

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GRAND CANYON WEST: An Indian view of the famous gorge


By Matt Kelley
Associated Press Writer


HUALAPAI INDIAN RESERVATION, Ariz. (AP) -- Edgar Walema is understandably
nervous as he leads visitors right to the edge of the Grand Canyon.

After all, it's nearly a mile straight down from here to where the Colorado
River winds its way to Lake Mead. There's no guardrail, no warning signs,
barely any evidence of humanity at all. Just the smell of desert dust, the
sound of a gentle breeze and one of the most spectacular views in North
America.

"We haven't lost anybody yet," says Walema, the vice-chairman of the
Hualapai tribe.

The 2,000-member tribe's million-acre reservation includes more than 100
miles of the 277-mile Grand Canyon.

Most tourists flock to the South Rim entrance at Grand Canyon National
Park, about 100 miles or so east of here. There they'll see the canyon as
well as a visitor center, museum, a string of parking lots and, just
outside the park, everything from a Taco Bell to an IMAX theater.

Not so at Grand Canyon West, the Hualapai Indian tribe's small tourist
outpost on the western end of the canyon. The tribe offers tourists a trip
as close to the rim as they dare, accompanied by a tribal member who talks
about the history of the tribe and the canyon and points out landmarks such
as Eagle Point, a formation which looks like a headless eagle, its wings
spread.

"The canyon is the beginning of our people," Walema explains. "Like the
Christians believe they came from Israel, our people, the Hualapai people,
our idea is that we were created here in the canyon.

"This is our stronghold. When the white man came and sent the cavalry after
us, the cavalry couldn't get back to us because we were in the canyon.

"Back in the 1800s, when we were rounded up and forced to relocate to the
deserts of California, a lot of our people perished on our Trail of Tears.
But a lot of people escaped and went right back into the canyons."

For tribal members such as Blake Watahomigie, the canyon is the tribe's
lifeblood again. After working construction jobs for non-Indian companies
on other reservations, Watahomigie returned to the Hualapai reservation
this year and now is a tour guide at Grand Canyon West.

"Now I'm employed on the reservation and I'm happy," says Watahomigie, 28.
"It's so great to be out here. It's so beautiful. People are just amazed."

Lunch, believe it or not, is a highlight of the Grand Canyon West trip for
many visitors. The tribe serves a barbecue buffet on a promontory jutting
into the canyon, and visitors eat on picnic tables surrounded on three
sides by the canyon.

The canyon is so vast -- more than a mile across at this point -- that it
seems to swallow most noises. The subtle shadings of red, pink and tan of
the rugged canyon walls seem to form pictures; here a thunderbird, there a
human face.

After lunch, tourists can stroll to the end of unfortunately-named Guano
Point, where a steel tower is about all that remains from a a bat guano
mining operation that has been closed for decades.

Getting to Grand Canyon West also can be an adventure. The road from the
nearest highway is called "unimproved," which is a polite way of saying
kiss your shocks good-bye.

While dodging fist-sized rocks and jolting over washboard gravel, those who
brave the road will see a forest of eerie-looking Joshua trees and the
towering formations of the Grand Wash Cliffs.

The tribe charges tourists who reach Grand Canyon West by car -- $22 each
for the guided tour of the rim or $27.50 for the tour plus lunch.

A more convenient way to Grand Canyon West is by air. Air tours from Las
Vegas, both by airplane and helicopter, regularly land at the tribe's paved
airstrip. Tour packages from Las Vegas start at about $110 and range all
the way up to a $360 extravaganza including a champagne picnic at the
bottom of the canyon.

Helicopter tours which take riders to the bottom of the canyon cost $89
from the Grand Canyon West terminal. The reservation is the only part of
the canyon where choppers are allowed to fly below the rim, and the
helicopter tours take visitors to areas inaccessible except by river raft.



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