Yaki Point is a small, slightly out-of-the-way balcony on the South Rim, and it is blessed with a fact that suits quiet people: the spur road is closed to private cars for most of the year, so you reach it by park shuttle instead. Which means that, strictly speaking, this is the one stop on Desert View Drive where the motorcycle waits in a car park and you do the last stretch sitting down. The view is worth the small indignity. Beneath you the canyon falls away in terraces and buttresses, with the great stone shapes that early explorers named after Hindu and Egyptian gods standing out in the middle distance.
The South Kaibab Trail starts here, dropping from the rim along a ridge that gives some of the finest views of any trail in the park. You do not need to go far to enjoy it. A hundred metres down, the horizon has already opened up, and the sound of the wind in the pinyons gives way to a profound hush. The geology is the star: the canyon is nearly a mile deep and 277 miles long, and the rock layers record close to two billion years of Earth history in their stripes.
Riding Desert View Drive itself is a gentle business. It follows the rim east from Grand Canyon Village for about 25 miles, through ponderosa pine and juniper, with a series of pull-outs on the canyon side and easy, rolling curves between them. The speed limit is low, and the park enforces it, as elk and tourists wander across without notice. Early morning, when the light picks out every ridge and the temperature is mild, is the best time. Summer afternoons can be hot at the rim and thundery, and winter brings ice and snow with sudden closures.
You pay a park entrance fee, and the rim is high, at roughly 2,100 metres, so nights can be cold even when the days are warm. Do not underestimate the altitude or the dry air, and drink more than you think necessary. Fuel is sold at Desert View, at the eastern end of the drive, though a petrol station at the other end of a long ride deserves some respect, and Grand Canyon Village and Tusayan outside the south gate have more. Eat in the village before you set off. Sunset here is a quiet, slow affair, and worth timing.