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Activities

There are many viewing points on all sides of the canyon, with the most accessible locations inside Grand Canyon National Park and the Hualapai Indian Reservation. About 90% of tourists visit the South Rim from Arizona State Route 64, which averages 7,000 feet (2,100 m) above sea level. The South Rim houses two visitor centers, a geological museum, art gallery/bookstore, and other attractions near Grand Canyon Village. Further east along the South Rim is the Desert View Watchtower. Grand Canyon National Park also has a visitor center in an easterly area known as the North Rim, via Arizona State Route 67; the center and the road are closed in winter months. On the Hualapai reservation, Grand Canyon West is the third major area with tourist services, about 125 mi (201 km) driving from Las Vegas and about 250 miles (400 km) by road from Grand Canyon Village at the South Rim. The tribe opened the glass-bottomed Grand Canyon Skywalk in 2007, which has since attracted "thousands of visitors a year, most from Las Vegas". Also at Grand Canyon West is Guano Point, which features a narrow peninsula surrounded on all sides by steep dropoffs. On the north side of the canyon to the west, the Grand Canyon–Parashant National Monument has no paved roads and no visitor services.

Rafting, hiking, running, and helicopter tours are also popular in the canyon area. The Grand Canyon Ultra Marathon is a 78-mile (126 km) race over 24 hours. The floor of the valley is accessible by foot, muleback, or by boat or raft from upriver. Hiking down to the river and back up to the rim in one day is discouraged by park officials because of the distance, steep and rocky trails, change in elevation, and danger of heat exhaustion from the much higher temperatures at the bottom. Rescues are required annually of unsuccessful rim-to-river-to-rim travelers. Nevertheless, hundreds of fit and experienced hikers complete the trip every year.

Camping on the North and South rims is generally restricted to established campgrounds and reservations are highly recommended, especially at the busier South Rim. There is at large camping available along many parts of the North Rim managed by Kaibab National Forest. North Rim campsites are only open seasonally due to road closures from weather and winter snowpack. All overnight camping below the rim requires a backcountry permit from the Backcountry Office (BCO). Each year Grand Canyon National Park receives approximately 30,000 requests for backcountry permits. The park issues 13,000 permits, and close to 40,000 people camp overnight. The earliest a permit application is accepted is the first of the month, four months before the proposed start month.

Tourists wishing for a more vertical perspective can go skydiving, board helicopters and small airplanes in Boulder, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Grand Canyon National Park Airport (seven miles from the South Rim) for canyon flyovers. Scenic flights are no longer allowed to fly within 1,500 feet (460 m) of the rim within the national park because of a late 1990s crash. The last aerial video footage from below the rim was filmed in 1984. However, some helicopter flights land on the Havasupai and Hualapai Indian Reservations within Grand Canyon (outside of the park boundaries).

In 2016, skydiving at the Grand Canyon become possible with the first Grand Canyon Skydiving operation opening up at the Grand Canyon National Park Airport, on the South Rim.

In 2014, a developer announced plans to build a multimedia complex on the canyon's rim called the Grand Canyon Escalade. On 420 acres (170 ha) there would be shops, an IMAX theater, hotels and an RV park. A gondola would enable easy visits to the canyon floor where a "riverwalk" of "connected walkways, an eatery, a tramway station, a seating area and a wastewater package plant" would be situated. On October 31, 2017, the Navajo Nation Council voted against the project.