In 2003 I drove from Boston, in the north-eastern corner of the US, to LA, in
the south-west, to attend and speak at the national animal rights conference
there. It took five days and cost under USD 150. I slept in the car (no
air-conditioning), eating canned and Chinese restaurant food. I did the same
thing in reverse about a year previously in temperatures up to 43 C being
tortured by right wing radio stations across the midwestern Bible Belt - it's
not fun. Good thing I'm Australian and a spiritual master of patience and pain
:)
On the way there I caught up with some good friends in Denver, and then headed out into the Colorado Rockies. Colorado and Arizona seem to be full of canyons, and at the very south-western corner of Colorado, just before hitting Arizona, I found the amazing Black Canyon of the Gunison (probably so named because light barely reaches the bottom). I stayed for the night, sleeping in my car at the canyon campground, arriving in the night and leaving in the early dawn before the ranger arrived to collect fees (I was broke).
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Black Canyon 1.
The differences in incline on each side of the canyon is due to differences in weathering. It sounds bizarre, but perhaps the erosion is worse on the eastern side, because it’s struck by the afternoon sun.