Trail of Time: Verkamp's Visitor Center Portal

Managing agency

National Park Service

From the flagpole outside of Verkamp's Visitor Center, walk to the right along the rim trail and find the Trail of Time bronze markers embedded in the pavement. From the 2,000 million year marker, you can see the western entry portal for the Trail of Time. Walking east from Grand Canyon Village takes you forward in time, from Grand Canyon's oldest rocks to canyon carving and Grand Canyon's human history. This is the "old" end of the main Trail of Time, so the theme for the paving stones and seating rocks around the portal is Precambrian schist and gneiss of the type found in the inner gorges, near the bottom of the canyon. Walk a bit further east along the trail and you can see and touch the oldest known rock of Grand Canyon's basement rocks! Trail of Time Overview The Trail of Time is the world's largest geoscience exhibition at one of the world's grandest geologic landscapes, Grand Canyon National Park. The trail utilizes the unique vistas and rocks of Grand Canyon to help visitors ponder, explore, and understand the magnitude of geologic time and the stories encoded by Grand Canyon rocks and landscapes. Geologic time is immensely long. The 4.56 km (2.8 mi) trail is marked every meter, with 1 meter = 1 million years of our 4,560,000,000 year-long Earth history. Viewing tubes, rocks on plinths, and wayside panels help visitors connect the rocks visible in Grand Canyon to their place along the timeline. The main Trail of Time can be entered at different points - including the east end near Yavapai Point (young end), west end at Grand Canyon Village (old end), or a middle point where a connecting trail comes from the Park Headquarters parking area (Parking Lot A). Shuttle stops connect each entry point, so you can walk it in several ways and still get back to your car. The entry portals have messages on each side appropriate for those approaching (welcome) or for those completing different segments of the Trail (congratulations). Located on the South Rim of Grand Canyon National Park, the Trail of Time extends along the paved Rim Trail between the Yavapai Geology Museum on the east and Maricopa Point on the west. The main portion of the Trail between Yavapai Geology Museum and Grand Canyon Village is accessible to wheelchairs and baby strollers, and it is convenient to shuttle bus stops and parking areas in a heavily-visited section of the park.