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The Grand Canyon

In around 2005, my family and I visited the Grand Canyon in Arizona during the summer. My experience seeing the canyons, crevices, cliffs, etc. in real life almost looked like a gigantic real-life painting just by looking at the entire landscape. From a distance, it looked like a painting, mostly due to the land being static because I wasn't close enough to see that the wind was likely shifting the land and fauna. The glowing yellow-orange afternoon sun, combined with the strong, cold winds made the journey to take a step outside a challenge to see the natural canvas that is the Grand Canyon. I could feel the cold wind hitting me as I walked around the canyon, taking photos with my family, proving to friends and family that I was there, known for its rich, geological landscape and a "Wonder of the Natural World".

My experience visiting the Grand Canyon in Second Life seemed a bit tad disappointing, mostly because I couldn't feel the physical attributes of the environment with my senses (touch, smell, taste), although I did get to hear and see the virtual Grand Canyon with the use of my avatar, as seen here in the two pictures above.

Most of my time spent was flying, due to the size of the place and the thought of walking as a means of exploration seemed bland. Using flight has its benefits in this virtual world, where you can quickly take yourself from one canyon and downwards. It was easy to get to one place to another, although it seemed a bit too easy and the use of flying made the experience dull as time came by. One reason that could be pointed out is that it just got easy to explore everything without taking the adventure of getting down to the crevice.

But considering how much physical time and money it would take to see the real Grand Canyon and the fact that we can't fly, unless we were biologically mutated to have limbs that could make us fly and possibly become light in terms of weight, we instead have the ability to use a digital replication of our imagination and memory in order to explore a digital Grand Canyon like the one I explored.

Overall, my experience with exploring the Grand Canyon made me reminisce the days when I went to the Grand Canyon years ago. Memory became an important aspect of my journey and it especially made it personal, as others may not have had the chance to go to the Grand Canyon.