Grand Canyon

Nik Wallenda, the man known as "King of the High Wire," will venture into Evel Knievel territory this summer when he makes a daring high-wire walk across the Grand Canyon. And those curious to see if he makes it will be able to watch the whole thing live on Discovery. To make things more interesting, Wallenda doesn't plan to use a safety harness or net. One wrong step and it's 1,500 feet straight down to the Little Colorado River. The daredevil made the announcement on NBC's "Today" on Monday morning, telling Matt Lauer that the Grand Canyon was "another one on the bucket list" of places he's wanted to traverse via tightrope.

If I close my eyes, I can almost see Bright Angel Creek spilling into the Colorado River at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. I've been here only twice and don't know if I'll ever make it again because it's a long, hard trip down from the rim - seven miles, losing 5,000 feet in elevation, along the South Kaibab Trail, the way I hiked into the Big Ditch in 2004, or a slightly more gradual 9.3 miles along Bright Angel Trail, the route I took before that...

ITALY Presentation Author Susan Van Allen will celebrate the second edition of "100 Places in Italy Every Woman Should Go" with a slide show and Q&A. When, where: 7:30 p.m. Monday at Distant Lands, 20 S. Raymond Ave., Pasadena. Admission, info: Free. RSVP to (626) 449-3220. GRAND CANYON Workshop Experts will offer tips on hiking the Grand Canyon rim to rim, as well as trip planning and resources. When, where: 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the REI store in Tustin, 2962 El Camino Real.

The Grand Canyon Reader Edited by Lance Newman University of California Press: 256 pages, $50, $19.95 (paper) The vicarious pleasure of armchair travel is a well-explored genre for books, transporting the reader without ever opening a door. What such books do, when they are thoughtfully presented, is to share the excitement and immediacy of exploration while sparing the reader the discomfort. In "The Grand Canyon Reader," Lance Newman's editing challenge was to illuminate an iconic place while offering a glimpse of something new. There is no lack for musings on the subject.

The Grand Canyon may be much older than widely believed, according to a new study that challenges the view that the American landmark was born 5 million or 6 million years ago. Analyzing helium levels in rocks chipped away from outcrops in the western portion of the canyon, geologist Rebecca Flowers of the University of Colorado at Boulder and geochemist Kenneth Farley of Caltech concluded that the gorge was already there - and within a few hundred...

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. — Who hasn't peered into this brain-bending abyss and failed to conceptualize 6 million years of stream erosion through a vertical mile of primordial rock? "I'm sorry, but there's no way a river did that," huffs a voice among this evening's mesmerized herd of South Rim-at-sunset gawkers. The voice belongs to my buddy Mark Segal, 40, a food service account manager from Long Beach. Or maybe it's my other friend Vic Leyson, 34, a business manager from Studio City.

Researchers in Grand Canyon National Park have discovered a prehistoric-looking sucker fish once thought to be extinct from the area. The fish, known as the razorback sucker, is the first of its species to be caught in the Grand Canyon in more than 20 years. The fish is characterized by a long, high sharp-edged hump behind its head. The creature was snagged by Arizona fish and wildlife officials in the Colorado River last week, in the lower part of the canyon system. So is this find one of those river monsters featured on cable television?

Bill Westphal, who resigned from his position as Occidental College basketball coach in 1988, was fired Thursday as coach at Grand Canyon University in Phoenix. Westphal replaced his brother, Paul, who left Grand Canyon in 1988 to become an assistant coach for the Phoenix Suns. Paul Westphal, a USC graduate, played guard for the Suns and Boston Celtics in the 1970s.

A 24-year-old tourist slipped and fell to his death while posing for a picture above the Grand Canyon, the fifth fatal fall since April, officials said. The accident occurred Tuesday at the canyon's south rim. The man's name was being withheld until relatives could be notified.