Episode 385 - Grand Canyon Mysteries (Part 1) | 1909 Egyptian Myth

It’s our anniversary! We’re celebrating nine years of Two Girls One Ghost with a two-part deep dive into one of the most mysterious places on Earth: the Grand Canyon. In Part 1, we explore the ancient history, sacred beliefs, and legends surrounding this massive natural wonder before diving into one of the wildest mysteries ever reported. In 1909, a newspaper claimed an explorer had discovered a hidden underground cavern filled with hieroglyphics, mummies, ancient artifacts, and a mysterious idol blending Egyptian and Buddhist imagery. But if the discovery was real, why was the cave never found again? As researchers search for answers, they uncover suspicious place names, restricted areas, and alleged government cover-ups. Watch the video version here. Have ghost stories of your own? E-mail them to us at [email protected] New Episodes are released every Thursday and Sunday at 12am PST/3am EST (the witching hour, of course). Corinne and Sabrina hand select a couple of paranormal encounters from our inbox to read in each episode, from demons, to cryptids, to aliens, to creepy kids... the list goes on and on. If you have a story of your own that you'd like us to share on an upcoming episode, we invite you to email them to us! If you enjoy our show, please consider joining our Patreon, rating and reviewing on iTunes & Spotify and following us on social media! Youtube, Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and Discord. Edited and produced by Jaimi Ryan. Original music by Arms Akimbo! Disclaimer: the use of white sage and smudging is a closed practice. If you’re looking to cleanse your space, here are some great alternatives! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Hey, everyone. This is Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. You know what you believe. Maybe your faith is at the center of your life. Maybe you're still figuring it out. Maybe religion just isn't your thing. Those choices are personal, and in America, they should stay personal. That's why Americans United for Separation of Church and State is fighting for something that affects all of us. The freedom to live as yourself and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. Because religious freedom isn't just about protecting your right to practice or not. And it surely isn't about having one forced government sanctioned religion. It's about protecting your right to say, this is what I believe, while your neighbor says,

• 0:44Speaker 00

  I believe something completely different. And honestly, that's the whole point. If that sounds like the kind of America you want, learn more at au.org/gettingbetter. Because your beliefs are yours, and theirs are theirs.

• 1:01Speaker 01

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• 1:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hi.

• 1:53Corinne Vien?

  Hi.

• 1:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hello.

• 1:55Corinne Vien?

  Hello. This is Two Girls One Ghost.

• 1:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Two Girls One Ghost. We are Ghosts, this is, that is Corinne.

• 2:01Corinne Vien?

  Hello.

• 2:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm Sabrina, and happy frickin' nine year anniversary.

• 2:07Corinne Vien?

  Isn't that crazy?

• 2:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It is actually crazy.

• 2:10Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. We've been doing this podcast for nine years. Nine years, not of our friendship, but that's a lot longer.

• 2:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Fifteen years is our friendship? We met in 2011?

• 2:18Corinne Vien?

  2011.

• 2:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, fifteen years.

• 2:20Corinne Vien?

  Last week of August, 2011.

• 2:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's all in August.

• 2:24Corinne Vien?

  August is our big month. Yeah, nine years of podcasting.

• 2:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's, I have very few words for it. It's kind of amazing.

• 2:33Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 2:34Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Especially given how many people have a podcast these days, which more than a year.

• 2:39Corinne Vien?

  Because at the time of, I can't remember like when this comes out versus when our, I don't think our Patreon.

• 2:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This is a week before, oh, wait, what?

• 2:45Corinne Vien?

  Our Patreon bonus comes out in August.

• 2:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I think it comes out the.

• 2:49Corinne Vien?

  Because we haven't recorded that one yet.

• 2:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Let's consult.

• 2:52Corinne Vien?

  We're recording things ahead of time, but I was looking, so we're doing, spoiler alert, on Patreon, we're doing a Q and A episode, which we've never done like a full Q and A episode. And so people on Patreon are submitting their questions, and I was looking through some of them yesterday, and someone asked like, how did you get people to start following your podcast? And I was like, thinking about it, it's, none of our advice is even, it doesn't apply to today, because it was so long ago.

• 3:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It was the wild, wild west back then.

• 3:17Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 3:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But here's what I did. I did guerrilla Instagram follows.

• 3:22Corinne Vien?

  Yes, just following everyone on Instagram.

• 3:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's so funny because still, it's nine years. So it's been nine years. And occasionally, we'll get a notification that says so and so accepted your friend request. Meaning someone from nine years ago, for nine years, our friend request has been sitting in their Instagram. And they finally, we finally made it.

• 3:44Corinne Vien?

  That's, that's what we did.

• 3:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 3:46Corinne Vien?

  And we asked our like 20 friends to rate and review us.

• 3:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, it's a little bit of delusion, but I think the best things start in a delusional way.

• 3:53Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 3:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This friendship being the example.

• 3:59Corinne Vien?

  Oh, God, sorry. And of course, I'm sick for our anniversary. Well, we don't know if I'm sick.

• 4:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It might be allergies.

• 4:04Corinne Vien?

  The doctor said it's allergies. We'll see.

• 4:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We'll see.

• 4:07Corinne Vien?

  But for our anniversary, we decided to share a topic.

• 4:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 4:12Corinne Vien?

  A topic that's kind of big, and could probably be a whole podcast series in and of itself.

• 4:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I literally wrote that in my research.

• 4:18Corinne Vien?

  Did you?

• 4:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 4:19Corinne Vien?

  Okay, well, we're trying to squeeze as much into two episodes as we can. The Grand Canyon.

• 4:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  The mysteries, the hauntings, the conspiracies.

• 4:29Corinne Vien?

  There's so much. Have you ever been?

• 4:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Of course.

• 4:32Corinne Vien?

  Of course.

• 4:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Of course. One time, Thanksgiving many moons ago, it was probably, what was it? It was like 2014. And all I remember is as I was driving, we called my grandma, R.I.P., love her, while we were driving.

• 4:46Corinne Vien?

  Coffee and cigarettes grandma?

• 4:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, oh, yeah, or Melinda. And she was so nervous. She was like, please don't fall in.

• 4:54Corinne Vien?

  That's how I feel about it.

• 4:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And I, we kind of laughed at the time, but then we got there late at night, and we were like, oh, let's go walk over to the rim.

• 5:01Corinne Vien?

  What the hell?

• 5:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And you cannot see anything. It is pitch black. Like, I understand why someone could fall in.

• 5:09Corinne Vien?

  And people fall in and just, oh, yeah, now I'm getting flashbacks of things that I saw on TikTok that I shouldn't have seen. Where like people do fall every year.

• 5:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 5:18Corinne Vien?

  And it's really horrific. But remember when we went to Niagara Falls? I feel like you were way braver about like getting towards the guardrail. And I was like, I can't, I can't.

• 5:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Crazy vertigo?

• 5:27Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 5:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 5:27Corinne Vien?

  I'm afraid of falling. I'm afraid that I will just jump.

• 5:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You're afraid of a lot. Your intrusive thoughts are probably the scariest.

• 5:34Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 5:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  The scariest things that could happen.

• 5:37Corinne Vien?

  Although one of my fears almost came true the other day.

• 5:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  What happened?

• 5:41Corinne Vien?

  Well, it's not, is it intrusive? I don't think so. I think it's a realistic visualization I bring myself through. I bring myself through a lot of survival moments every day. But I always picture, I'm such a dog person, but I visualize if a dog were to attack me or to attack Noah, the quickest way to possibly kill the dog.

• 6:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Mm-hmm, and?

• 6:04Corinne Vien?

  Two days ago, a neighbor's dog gets out and is super excited, beelines for Noah. I run and grab him, and the dog is like circling and jumping on me, and he's excited, but he's like biting and scratching.

• 6:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 6:16Corinne Vien?

  It was a friendly dog, but like if it wasn't.

• 6:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, no, it's scary.

• 6:19Corinne Vien?

  I was there and I was just like, I mean, I'm not going to do anything to this dog, because this dog is friendly.

• 6:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 6:24Corinne Vien?

  But in my mind, I was like, this is my.

• 6:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, it's very scary.

• 6:27Corinne Vien?

  Visualization.

• 6:29Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 6:30Corinne Vien?

  Almost coming true.

• 6:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So Jennifer Lawrence did an interview, I don't remember what show it was on, like it was a late night show, and she was asked if she was a cat person or a dog person, and she said, ever since having a kid, I'm a cat person. They literally gave their dog to her mom.

• 6:45Corinne Vien?

  Oh, really?

• 6:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Because she was like, I couldn't stop seeing my dog as a threat to my child.

• 6:50Corinne Vien?

  Oh, interesting.

• 6:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And I got, like, she couldn't stop thinking about this dog potentially biting or hurting her tiny baby.

• 6:58Corinne Vien?

  Honestly, like, I'm more afraid of cats than I am dogs, because I feel like when cats attack you, they can climb and latch on other places, so it's harder to like get them off of you. Are they going to murder you? Probably not. But I agree with her that in like having a kid, all animals and all species are potential threats and enemies. It's just kind of a blanket, like.

• 7:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 7:21Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 7:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Although then there's also the flip side. When my sister was pregnant with no Emmy, my brother's dog, Jackson, was so protective of my sister and would like come lay his head on her pregnant belly before she was even like showing and really telling people, like he just knew.

• 7:36Corinne Vien?

  He could sense it.

• 7:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then was just like very guard dog. It was like very, very, very cute.

• 7:40Corinne Vien?

  Wrinkles was like that too. He like didn't, there was a baby around, like even the parent like couldn't go near the baby, he was guarding. My mom would call him Nana, because he was like, and it wasn't just babies, it was like, if there were little bunnies or just like any small creature, he was very protective of babies.

• 7:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Very sweet.

• 7:55Corinne Vien?

  Little Nana. Anyway, this is about the Grand Canyon and the horrors.

• 7:59Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes.

• 8:00Corinne Vien?

  Of the Grand Canyon. The mysteries, but like also amazement of something so.

• 8:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's exactly how I was gonna start. So I was gonna talk about the history and like the magic of this place, because very similar to Appalachia, it is so, it's ancient.

• 8:13Corinne Vien?

  Yes.

• 8:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There's a place, we already said what it is, but I'm gonna read it like I wrote it. I can't, I'm not an improv.

• 8:21Corinne Vien?

  I didn't know you were in Joe.

• 8:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It is located in the American Southwest. It is a place so massive, so ancient, so otherworldly that people have been standing at its edge for thousands of years, wondering what in the world is going on down there? And how in the world did something so miraculous and so grand form? This is the Grand Canyon. It is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide, over a mile deep. Layers and layers of rock formations, and each layer holds a chapter of Earth's history going back almost 2 billion years.

• 8:56Corinne Vien?

  So crazy.

• 8:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And if you have not been, even a photo takes your breath away. Like, it is just, it's hard to fathom that this exists naturally in our world.

• 9:05Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, I flew over and I took a picture of it flying over. It's like obvious.

• 9:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, you can't miss it.

• 9:10Corinne Vien?

  There's a giant frickin' hole in the Earth.

• 9:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right. And then standing before is unlike anything you've seen before. It's a natural wonder, a sacred place, a spiritual place, and also a very mysterious place. Hidden within its depths are thousands of unexplored caves, petroglyphs left behind by civilizations that vanished without explanation. There are ruins of ancient peoples, stories told by generations past of spirits that are both ancient and new, wailing women, wandering ghosts, phantom miners, and so many more. It is a sacred place, and the Navajo have long spoken of the energy here, that it is alive and it is vengeful. Since the mid 1800, over 900 people have died in the Grand Canyon.

• 9:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And more than 1,000 people have been reported missing, which is the highest number of missing person reports in all of US national parks.

• 10:02Corinne Vien?

  Wow.

• 10:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Isn't that wild?

• 10:03Corinne Vien?

  But I believe it because have you seen how quickly, like when the weather changes, like even like a mile away?

• 10:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:10Corinne Vien?

  The flooding that can happen and people are walking through like narrow pathways. I feel like if you're used to hiking like a normal mountain.

• 10:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Mm hmm.

• 10:19Corinne Vien?

  You're just like, oh, well, climb in elevation. You can't like you're, the walls are slime and like sharp rock. Like you're trapped where you are. So you better run for your life, literally, or you will go missing.

• 10:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. And we'll talk about the ghosts or a couple of them. We'll like talk generally about the ghosts. There's so many, so I kind of just like picked a couple like hot topics.

• 10:38Corinne Vien?

  Hot topics.

• 10:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hot topics.

• 10:39Corinne Vien?

  And I have one, one like paranormal.

• 10:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 10:43Corinne Vien?

  Like a place that you can go visit next week that has ghosts.

• 10:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You can go visit it next week?

• 10:48Corinne Vien?

  Well, I'm gonna talk about it next week. You can also go next week.

• 10:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You can go whenever you want.

• 10:53Corinne Vien?

  Do whatever you want.

• 10:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. So yeah, happy nine year podcast anniversary. I wrote, let's get ghoulish because.

• 10:59Corinne Vien?

  Nice.

• 11:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You really like that word now and we're bringing it back. Um, have you been?

• 11:04Corinne Vien?

  No.

• 11:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You've just flown over it?

• 11:05Corinne Vien?

  I will never go. It's not on my, it's on my anti bucket list.

• 11:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I feel like you have a lot of places on your anti bucket list.

• 11:10Corinne Vien?

  I will not go.

• 11:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, there's so many places that are on my bucket list.

• 11:13Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 11:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm not done traveling. I actually, wait, it just remind me of senior year when everyone went to Cabo for spring break. I did a spring break trip with like a couple of like our guy friends. We rented an RV.

• 11:25Corinne Vien?

  Didn't you go to Joshua Tree?

• 11:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We went, we did like all bunch of national parks. We did Grand Canyon, Joshua Tree. Where are the hoodoos? Went to Zion. Where are the hoodoos? Let's see.

• 11:37Corinne Vien?

  I don't know, but this feels like a.

• 11:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Bryce Canyon.

• 11:40Corinne Vien?

  Bryce Canyon.

• 11:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I don't know why they're called hoodoos, but I love them.

• 11:43Corinne Vien?

  I felt like that was part of a musical, like you were about to break out into songs.

• 11:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hoodoos.

• 11:47Corinne Vien?

  Hoodoos is definitely in some sort of like.

• 11:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's like rock formations.

• 11:50Corinne Vien?

  Oh.

• 11:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Not all cool.

• 11:52Corinne Vien?

  That was really cool.

• 11:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. But when we went to the Grand Canyon on that trip, I, I don't know if it was because we had been like out on the road for so long and was dehydrated or something. I got so lightheaded as we started to hike the Grand Canyon that I was like, I have to turn back. I'm not attempting fate.

• 12:09Corinne Vien?

  Good thing that you made that decision.

• 12:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Cause maybe I wouldn't be here today.

• 12:13Corinne Vien?

  No.

• 12:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Back to the Grand Canyon. Let's talk about the history and the canyon itself. So like I said, it's located in northwestern Arizona and was carved by the Colorado River over millions of years. What I love and I think is so cool is the rocks literally tell a story. The rocks at the very, very bottom of the canyon are called the Vishnu Shist layer. And they are approximately 1.8 billion years old. And as context, Earth is believed to be 4.54 billion years old. So like not.

• 12:41Corinne Vien?

  They've been dating a long time.

• 12:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, they've been friends as long as we have.

• 12:45Corinne Vien?

  This is their anniversary episode two.

• 12:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Happy anniversary, Grand Canyon and Vishnu layer rocks. Um, and then even the rocks that stood at the very top of the canyon, they are also ancient. They are about 270 million years old.

• 12:58Corinne Vien?

  Oh, man. You know what's so crazy? It's like, you know, when people get excited going into a filming location and they're like, oh my God, Meryl Streep breathed here or whatever. Like Elvis out on this exact chair.

• 13:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This exact toilet.

• 13:10Corinne Vien?

  Dinosaurs touched those rocks.

• 13:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They peed on those rocks.

• 13:15Corinne Vien?

  Ancient people touched the rocks.

• 13:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They peed on those rocks. I don't know why I'm obsessed with going to the bathroom.

• 13:20Corinne Vien?

  On the rocks.

• 13:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, there probably feces in the rocks. Why am I a child? Okay.

• 13:25Corinne Vien?

  Well, there probably is.

• 13:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There probably is.

• 13:27Corinne Vien?

  Fossilized doo doo.

• 13:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 13:29Corinne Vien?

  Go see for yourself. Visit Grand Canyon National Park in the United States of America.

• 13:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then this like felt so romantic to me is like viewing the Grand Canyon as almost like a textbook. It literally is the pages of history in rock formation.

• 13:45Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 13:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Isn't that, I just like felt like that was the coolest thing. Anyway, I got lost in my own little like romance of the Grand Canyon. The canyon itself is believed to have begun forming between five and six million years ago as the Colorado River slowly cut through the Colorado Plateau. And again, this place is massive. We're talking 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide and over a mile deep. It is also the second most visited national park in America. But despite that high visitation rate, only a fraction of the Grand Canyon has been explored. So like I kept relating it to the ocean.

• 14:23Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 14:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like we know more about space than we do about our own ocean. And it's kind of the same with the Grand Canyon because it's so treacherous and incredibly difficult to get in and out of certain places. That a fraction of it has actually been explored.

• 14:36Corinne Vien?

  And which I'll cover, like it just touch on next week. There are cave systems. So even what you can see on the surface is not the whole thing.

• 14:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, we're going to be talking about one of the caves today.

• 14:49Corinne Vien?

  Here we go.

• 14:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But before we get to the caves, there are a lot of really cool things that have, that historians and archaeologists have found in the Grand Canyon that have taught us a lot about the history of civilizations that have lived here.

• 15:01Corinne Vien?

  Hmm.

• 15:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So there were these split twig figurines found in caves just below the rim of the canyon. Making them some of the oldest physical evidence that humans lived in and around the Grand Canyon.

• 15:12Corinne Vien?

  Like little dolls?

• 15:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They look like this.

• 15:14Corinne Vien?

  Oh.

• 15:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They were made of willow and cottonwood twigs, so shaped into deer and sheep.

• 15:18Corinne Vien?

  They do feel like toys for kids.

• 15:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So I was trying to learn what it was about and they date back some 4,000 years ago and are believed to be ritualistic totems. That were placed inside the caves like with intention.

• 15:32Corinne Vien?

  Okay.

• 15:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's like an offering or I'm not sure. We also know that throughout history, many tribes called the Grand Canyon home. The ancestral Puebloans, also known as the Anasazi, meaning the ancient ones, lived in the canyon region around 500 AD. And they left behind ruins of adobe homes and petroglyphs etched into the canyon walls. They would literally farm inside the inner canyon during the winter and then hunt on the north rim during summer. They lived in the canyons.

• 16:00Corinne Vien?

  Is that not what communities do now?

• 16:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Some do, yes.

• 16:03Corinne Vien?

  Are you gonna get there?

• 16:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Very, very briefly, but like you can see these petroglyphs and etchings into the rocks.

• 16:10Corinne Vien?

  Crazy like that stuff still is visible, you know, that it hasn't just been washed away or eroded or.

• 16:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, then also like for this to like be etched into the stone, like that takes so much time too.

• 16:23Corinne Vien?

  But it's also exposed to the elements. It's not like inside of a cave, at least in the picture that you're showing.

• 16:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So there are some in caves and then they also, I don't think it's specifically in the Grand Canyon, but I know in like Sedona. I think it's the same people, the, the Puebloans like built like structures into the actual face of the rocks. And they still exist, like the houses.

• 16:44Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, I've seen people's videos and pictures and stuff where they're like walking and then it'll be like 200 feet above them. It will look like there's an archway or like a window into something, but it's just carved into the rock. And you're like, right. What is that?

• 16:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, it's wild.

• 16:58Corinne Vien?

  Which adds to the mystery too, because then you're like, ooh, is there a giant that lives behind there?

• 17:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe. But as far as we know, the mysteries of the Grand Canyon started as early as like the first civilizations that lived there. So the Puebloans actually suddenly up and left the region with no explanation. They were there and then suddenly they were not, and we still to this day do not know why.

• 17:19Corinne Vien?

  Interesting.

• 17:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We know that at least nine.

• 17:21Corinne Vien?

  They, we know where they went?

• 17:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes, I think we know where they went, but we don't know why they fled the Grand Canyon. Uh, we also know that at least nine, although some sources said 11, Native American tribes have deep cultural ties to the Grand Canyon. One of which still lives inside the Grand Canyon today. So the Havasapi people of, which they're called the people of the blue green water, live in a remote village called Supai. That is only accessible by foot, pack animal or by the river, and they still live here.

• 17:50Corinne Vien?

  Mm hmm.

• 17:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And one place that I really do wish I could go to in the Grand Canyon is the Havasupai Falls. But I think you have to access it from like a different region and then it's like a long hike, but look how stunning.

• 18:00Corinne Vien?

  Oh my God, beautiful.

• 18:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That blue water.

• 18:03Corinne Vien?

  Huh. Also, if anyone's interested in what life is like living in this community, there is a girl who lives there who TikToks about it.

• 18:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  See, gotta love TikTok.

• 18:13Corinne Vien?

  So we do have access.

• 18:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 18:16Corinne Vien?

  I've only seen a couple of her videos where she was like explaining how they pack things in and like how to mule and show kind of like the path into the village and stuff.

• 18:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's amazing.

• 18:24Corinne Vien?

  But yeah.

• 18:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Cause it's not like a safe, comfy, cozy place to live.

• 18:28Corinne Vien?

  No.

• 18:29Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Every native tribe that has lived here carry deep beliefs about the land about and about what lives within it. While the stories and superstitions vary, the one thing is true amongst all tribes. The land is sacred. The Hopi people believe that their ancestors literally emerged from the underworld through the Grand Canyon. Their tradition says the people once lived in an underground world inside of the canyon. And when the good people needed to escape, their chief caused a tree to grow up through the roof of the underworld and they climbed out of it. Emerging into what they refer to as the present fourth world, which is our world.

• 19:05Corinne Vien?

  The fourth world?

• 19:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, and maybe it's like dimensions like.

• 19:09Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 19:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But after they emerged, they were guided and greeted by a spirit guardian, a caretaker of earth. Who granted them permission to live on the land peacefully as long as they would act as earth stewards and in harmony with nature. They believe that the Grand Canyon is the ultimate spiritual realm and that upon death, the spirits of their ancestors all return to the canyon. Isn't that amazing?

• 19:30Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. I, my brain immediately went to the haunted mansion, the ballroom scene. And I was just like picturing everyone, all these spirits at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, just like waltzing around and partying.

• 19:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So remember that story because it will come back.

• 19:43Corinne Vien?

  Okay.

• 19:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  When we talk about the, the mystery cave that we're going to talk about.

• 19:47Corinne Vien?

  Gotcha.

• 19:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But there's also the Navajos who have a deep root and spiritual beliefs in the Grand Canyon. They speak of protective spirits who guide those who show the land respect. But for those who disrespect the land, something darker awaits them.

• 20:03Corinne Vien?

  Hmm.

• 20:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Shape shifting entities that bring illness and curse. Can you guess the name of those entities?

• 20:09Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 20:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Flesh pedestrians.

• 20:11Corinne Vien?

  Mm hmm.

• 20:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  SWs, I'm not going to say them again. I feel like I've said them so much.

• 20:15Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, I feel like every, somehow they're getting woven into every topic that you're covering.

• 20:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But this is like, it reminds me so much of Appalachia where it's like, if you respect the land.

• 20:25Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 20:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And if you follow the rules, you will be.

• 20:29Corinne Vien?

  Nature will take care of you.

• 20:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Nature will take care of you. If you disrespect the land, not only will nature not take care of you, they will send vengeful spirits after you.

• 20:38Corinne Vien?

  Yes.

• 20:38Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So similar to the Hopi people, the Navajos believe the Grand Canyon is a place where the physical and spiritual world intersect. And there is one oral history from the Navajo people that recounts how a warrior deity named the Monster Slayer. And that's like the translation of it. Fought a wandering rock monster that was hoarding all of the world's water. In exchange for life, the monster promised to create paths for water, which carved the canyon with the Colorado River.

• 21:07Corinne Vien?

  I like that.

• 21:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So of course, there are many more beliefs and other stories, and they're very rich with native history here. But I wanted to share these like couple of ones, just to like paint the picture of how important it is to respect the land, especially here in the Grand Canyon. Well, everywhere you should respect the land. But if you do, the land and spirits of the land will reward you. But should you disrespect it, you will be punished. And then also, the history of the Grand Canyon, unfortunately, is not complete without colonization and bloodshed.

• 21:35Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Hey, everyone, this is Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. You know what you believe. Maybe your faith is at the center of your life. Maybe you're still figuring it out. Maybe religion just isn't your thing. Those choices are personal, and in America, they should stay personal. That's why Americans United for Separation of Church and State is fighting for something that affects all of us. The freedom to live as yourself and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. Because religious freedom isn't just about protecting your right to practice or not. And it surely isn't about having one forced government sanctioned religion. It's about protecting your right to say, this is what I believe, while your neighbor

• 22:19Speaker 00

  says, I believe something completely different. And honestly, that's the whole point. If that sounds like the kind of America you want, learn more at au.org/gettingbetter. Because your beliefs are yours, and theirs are theirs.

• 22:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Whenever fall comes back around, it always feels like a fresh start. This year, I've been layering in some styles from the new Lululemon fall drop, because the weather is shifting and I find I have to be ready for the entire day and not just one part of it. Lululemon's fall line has some really versatile transitional pieces, so I can just wake up, throw on a matching set, add a jacket or a fleece, and head out, knowing that I'll feel comfortable enough to go wherever the day takes me. Check out the new fall arrivals in store and online now at lululemon.com.

• 23:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I talked about the native tribes who first settled here, but then the Spanish first laid eyes on the Grand Canyon in 1540.

• 23:13Corinne Vien?

  God, where were the Spanish not?

• 23:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And they-

• 23:16Corinne Vien?

  Those people be sailing-

• 23:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  The conquistadors.

• 23:18Corinne Vien?

  Yes.

• 23:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes.

• 23:21Corinne Vien?

  Yes.

• 23:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They were guided to the south rim by the Hopi guides, and they spent, so they were planning to go down, they believed that the seven cities of gold were like in the Grand Canyon. And the Hopi guides were bringing them there so they could go look. They tried to descend into the gorge.

• 23:38Corinne Vien?

  Wait, do the native people think that, or just the Spanish?

• 23:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I'm not totally clear. I didn't go too deep dive on this.

• 23:45Corinne Vien?

  Who told them this? Honestly, kind of a brilliant thing to get these people who might ruffle feathers amongst your community and ruin things for you, send them on a gold hunt somewhere really dangerous.

• 23:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then they never come back?

• 23:56Corinne Vien?

  And then they never come back.

• 23:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This reminded me of Superstition Mountains a little bit.

• 24:00Corinne Vien?

  Mm, uh huh. Oh, Superstition Mountains is actually, I feel like we don't bring up that episode enough.

• 24:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There's a good one.

• 24:07Corinne Vien?

  That one scared me.

• 24:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 24:08Corinne Vien?

  Like the little people who just chop your head off?

• 24:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh, yeah. So many people have died there and gone missing there.

• 24:13Corinne Vien?

  And decapitated. Decapitation.

• 24:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We should also do like a series about like treasure hunting, because I feel like that's also, I really want to do The Curse of Oak Island.

• 24:21Corinne Vien?

  Oh, shit.

• 24:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Danielle from National Park After Dark posted about a book about that, and I bought it, and I have not read it, but it's a big book, so I feel like, stay tuned, eventually we'll get there.

• 24:32Corinne Vien?

  Is it fiction, the book?

• 24:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, I think it's the true story.

• 24:35Corinne Vien?

  Oh, it is the true story.

• 24:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 24:37Corinne Vien?

  Interesting. I keep thinking about National Park After Dark as we're doing this episode, too.

• 24:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 24:41Corinne Vien?

  Because this is their whole thing.

• 24:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's their whole thing. So they, the Spanish tried to descend into the gorge, looking for the seven cities of gold, but the terrain and exploration was too dangerous, they literally had to give up. And despite being guided by the Hopi people on the expedition, peace did not last long. The arrival of Spanish explorers and later US prospectors brought a lot of bloodshed. During the 1860s, as settlers flooded Arizona, the US Army forced many natives out of their land by gunpoint. In 1871, there was a horrific massacre known as Camp Grant Massacre, where just south of the Grand Canyon, a group of colonizers attacked, killed, and mutilated 144 Apache people who had already peacefully surrendered.

• 25:24Corinne Vien?

  Oh, why? Why are people so bad?

• 25:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Gross. So just generally, there's a lot of like mass displacement and murder, and this is just context to like help you understand how much death has happened in this area. But then, one of the most notable explorations and mapping quests of the Grand Canyon is generally considered to be that of Major John Wesley Powell, who was a one-armed Civil War veteran who led the first government-funded expedition through the canyon by boat in 1869. And some of these pictures are really cool.

• 25:57Corinne Vien?

  Wait, 1869? When did we first get cameras? Why did I think it was like 1880? That feels so early to me to have-

• 26:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  1816 was the first camera.

• 26:06Corinne Vien?

  Damn.

• 26:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But I mean, it was probably-

• 26:08Corinne Vien?

  I'm forgetting facts.

• 26:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  1888 was when the Kodak, a consumer-friendly box camera, was invented.

• 26:15Corinne Vien?

  Okay, maybe that's what was in my mind, when it's like become more accessible to the public.

• 26:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Well, so this expedition was funded by the Smithsonian Institute, and that's important to note, just keep it in the back of your noggin. Um, okay, so on May 24th, 1869, Powell and nine other men departed in four wooden boats. They spent three months navigating the dangerous rapids through the canyon and lost during this adventure, adventure, exploration. This wasn't for shits and giggles, this was, this was their job.

• 26:46Corinne Vien?

  It was an adventure, but-

• 26:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They lost a lot of their provisions in the, like, they fell out of the boats and endured extreme heat.

• 26:53Corinne Vien?

  There's a lot of rapids.

• 26:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. Just days before the end of their exploration, three men left because they were so, like, they left the boat because they were so scared that they wouldn't make it out.

• 27:03Corinne Vien?

  Wow.

• 27:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And they were afraid they would starve or die through the rapids, so they chose to hike out instead. Those three men have never been seen again.

• 27:11Corinne Vien?

  No, oh, God.

• 27:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. The other men who did stay in the boat, so I think it would be six, the other six men, successfully emerged from the Grand Canyon on August 20th, 1869.

• 27:21Corinne Vien?

  Damn.

• 27:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And again, this was funded by the Smithsonian Institute. They wanted to retrieve documentation, so photos, maps, geological data, which is why they sent John Wesley Powell, and that's what he brought home. He also brought home-

• 27:34Corinne Vien?

  It's kind of crazy how much our curiosity as human beings kills us.

• 27:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yep.

• 27:39Corinne Vien?

  Like, we had to map it.

• 27:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. Which I am glad, someone did it, but I don't have to do it.

• 27:45Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 27:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But when-

• 27:46Corinne Vien?

  But no one has to do it.

• 27:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No. But it's nice to know what land we live on.

• 27:50Corinne Vien?

  It's nice to open up your coffee table book and see the, the perimeter drawing of your Grand Canyon.

• 27:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It is a little bit of survival back then. Like, I think about Oregon Trail and all those things, too. Like, someone had to go first-

• 28:01Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, I guess.

• 28:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  -to pave the way so that people could get to travel safely.

• 28:04Corinne Vien?

  Who gets dysentery first?

• 28:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. That game, Oregon Trail.

• 28:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Everyone dies.

• 28:08Corinne Vien?

  I've actually never played it.

• 28:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You can't really complete it. I don't think anyone's ever completed it without dying.

• 28:13Corinne Vien?

  Do you win?

• 28:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There was a board game version of it, and this is back, back in the olden days with Nick, where we tried to play, like, immediately the first card I flipped, it was like, you died. Dysentery. Yeah, I was like, okay, wait, do we restart? Like, how do we move along here?

• 28:28Corinne Vien?

  Not a very fun game if everyone's just dying right away.

• 28:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But so when Powell came home, he also came back with a deep respect for the place. Like, he was so grateful to have survived his travels, and he provided many key insights into the formation of the Grand Canyon. He was the one who realized that the Colorado River had carved through the layer of rocks over millions of years. And even today, it is said that his ghost haunts the canyon. Like, that was so formative to him and like so important to his life, that when he died, he went back.

• 28:56Corinne Vien?

  Did he go back, or does the canyon keep people there?

• 29:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, it's kind of like the Hopi people, how they believe when you die, your spirit goes back to the Grand Canyon.

• 29:06Corinne Vien?

  So- Some sort of little energy vortex.

• 29:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Okay, so from this time on, after Powell's expedition, so many other groups like set to do the same and explore and document the Grand Canyon, and almost immediately, people began to share haunting tales. And there's one of these expeditions that told of a mysterious cave. A cave with mummies and other remarkable finds. So this is the mystery of the 1909 Egyptian caves.

• 29:34Corinne Vien?

  I love this one.

• 29:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  On April 5th, 1909, a newspaper called The Arizona Gazette, a Phoenix newspaper, ran a front page story. This is very real, we have the evidence of it, like a photo of it. This is what the headline read. "Explorations in the Grand Canyon. Mysteries of Immense Rich Cavern Being Brought to Light. Remarkable Finds Indicate Ancient People Migrated From Orient." What was detailed in this article is one of the most wild and detailed news stories ever published in American history.

• 30:04Corinne Vien?

  Dang, I didn't know that.

• 30:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  According to the article, one singular lone explorer, which also was crazy, named G.E. Kincaid, had been on an expedition down the Colorado River. He, similar to Powell, started from the Green River in Wyoming and traveled all the way to Yuma, Arizona, by wooden boat. I looked it up because I was so curious, like, how long is this? If you were to drive, it would take today 13 hours and 2 minutes. It is over 875 miles by road. So now imagine that by river, by yourself in a simple wooden boat. So this is the same path that Powell and his nine fellow explorers took. And like the nine of them together had a hard time surviving. Like three of them did not survive. But here GE Kincaid was by himself.

• 30:49Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  He said that about 42 miles up the river from El Tovar Crystal Canyon, and that's what we call it today. I don't know if it was named that then. He saw stains in the sedimentary formation. This was approximately 2,000 feet above the river. He was so curious. So naturally, he stopped, pulled his boat over by the side of the river and to explore. There was no trail whatsoever, but that did not stop him. By himself, he climbed up the canyon to a shelf. And it was there, on this shelf, that he found an entrance to a cave. Naturally, he went inside. And what awaited him was beyond anything he ever could have imagined. His flabbers were gasted as he gazed upon something extraordinary.

• 31:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Nearly 1,480 feet below the surface, he followed this long passageway that led to a massive chamber. From that chamber, there were dozens of passageways that radiated outward, like the spokes of a wheel. So there's like one main chamber, lots of different paths, passageways.

• 31:48Corinne Vien?

  Which door do you choose?

• 31:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They were each about 12 feet wide. And as he traveled each walkway, he discovered several hundred rooms, chambers that were 30 to 40 feet square with walls three and a half feet thick. But it wasn't the architectural feat that astonished him. It is what these chambers held within. Tablets engraved with hieroglyphics, copper weapons and tools, granaries filled with seeds, urns and cooking utensils. And then in the central chamber, a shrine with a large idol carved from hard marble-like rock. And this was a massive idol. It was like a man in a seated, cross-legged position, holding a lotus flower in each hand.

• 32:34Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So the article that was published in April of 1909 described it as if resembling a Buddha, but more Egyptian in character. And just to note, there is a photo in the YouTube video. It's not an actual photo from the cave, but it's one that like a lot of websites use to be like, this is in essence what he saw.

• 32:54Corinne Vien?

  Oh, interesting. Oh, my gosh.

• 32:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like massive.

• 32:56Corinne Vien?

  It's much more elaborate too than I was expecting.

• 32:59Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Also, within this chamber were mummies. Rows and rows of mummies wrapped and preserved. Of course, GE Kincaid was in awe and also thrilled because he's like, wow, I just discovered this like amazing finding. And if you're an explorer at this time, like you're finding like pretty much gold. Like you're going to become rich. And then also now you're being able to bring forth this incredible hidden history of the Grand Canyon to the public. So he completes his expedition and he spread news of his discovery, which led to the publication of this article on April 5th, 1909, in the Arizona Gazette. In the article, Kincaid apparently, and I'm not, I didn't read the whole article, but I think either he claimed or the person who wrote the article like,

• 33:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  learned that the expedition was funded by the Smithsonian Institute, the same institute that funded Powell in 1869. And Kincaid claimed it was led by a professor named S.A. Jordan. The article continued to declare that the findings and the artifacts within this cave almost conclusively proved that the race which inhabited this mysterious cavern, hewn in solid rock by human hands, was possibly from Egypt, tracing back to Ramses. And of course, that's like a very powerful statement to make and also a bold claim to make. Cause like, he just saw it. He didn't do like a ton of analysis of it. But I think based on how it looked.

• 34:23Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 34:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That was the assumption they were making.

• 34:26Corinne Vien?

  Which is also, why? Why would the Egyptians find themselves there? And given the number of mummified bodies and how extensive the rooms and the caves and everything is, this seems like a large population of people.

• 34:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Not to mention thousands and thousands and thousands of miles away across oceans. Like, this is not anywhere near Egypt.

• 34:49Corinne Vien?

  No. And you can't even make an argument that like Pangaea once connected the...

• 34:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, so that's...

• 34:54Corinne Vien?

  Oh, is that one of the arguments?

• 34:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So they were basically...

• 34:57Corinne Vien?

  Well, Africa was connected, but like not...

• 35:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But not close enough, yeah.

• 35:01Corinne Vien?

  Like if they were in Virginia, okay.

• 35:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe. But okay, so this is a quote from the article. Egypt and the Nile and Arizona and the Colorado River will be linked by a historical chain running back to ages, which will stagger the wildest fancy of the fictionist. So basically implying that perhaps in the past, these two places were accessible in some way.

• 35:22Corinne Vien?

  But that's so long ago that like what you're viewing as Egyptian practices, people weren't even in existence at that point.

• 35:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And also like, why in this like random place in a cave in the midst of the Grand Canyon? It's not like at the beginning of the Grand Canyon. It's like in the middle and no one's ever found any finds like this.

• 35:41Corinne Vien?

  Is this a journey to the center of the earth type of situation?

• 35:44Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I imagine if you did discover something that, yes, your mind would go to these like grand theories and be like, were they connected in the past? What do, what are we missing?

• 35:54Corinne Vien?

  Weird cave system. Is there a magical portal? Did aliens transport them here? Did they have spaceships or airplanes? And we just lost all information about it?

• 36:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I mean, there's so much alien conspiracy with Egyptian practices and how they built the pyramids and stuff. But point being, this was an amazing discovery.

• 36:15Corinne Vien?

  Yes.

• 36:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  You would think after this article was published, there would be further expeditions conducted or that GE Kincaid himself would have returned to the caves and brought other people to actually study these findings.

• 36:27Corinne Vien?

  Right.

• 36:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But here's the thing. As far as we know, literally nothing came from this discovery. Which of course, we can explain away in many different ways. Like there are so many different expeditions going on, lack of funding. Maybe they did try to find it again, but like he lost...

• 36:40Corinne Vien?

  No one's ever tried?

• 36:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe he lost track of like where it was or like mislabeled it on a map. I don't know. Here's what we do know. In 1962, so 51 years, hmm, 52. When was the article published? 53 years. A book called The Arizona Cavalcade was published. It was a collection of historical newspaper articles from the state of Arizona and the 1909 Gazette article was included and put back into circulation for the first time in decades. Then in 1992, the story was published again in a book called The Lost Cities of the North and Central America, written by David Hatcher Childress. Because David had grown up, he had heard of and read the original article. I think he grew up in Arizona or around this area

• 37:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  and he was struck by the strangeness of it. How could this have been published, front page news? Why couldn't he find anything else about this cave or this discovery? So David's like, you know what? I'm going to go look for the cave. He personally made several attempts to search the region. But every time he thinks he got close, he was blocked or denied further passage by park rangers.

• 37:49Corinne Vien?

  Interesting.

• 37:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Every single time. Which is also wild because like, why are park rangers like stationed kind of in the canyon around this region?

• 37:56Corinne Vien?

  Right.

• 37:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Preventing people from going in.

• 37:58Corinne Vien?

  Well, now we need to hear from park rangers.

• 38:01Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I know. They probably aren't allowed to talk. They've been silenced.

• 38:04Corinne Vien?

  Well, a lot of them aren't employed anymore. So is your NDA up? Can you tell us?

• 38:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Tell us the secrets. But so every time he was blocked, like the park rangers would claim hazards in the canyon or concerning weather patterns, which like very fair, probably true. But every time.

• 38:20Corinne Vien?

  It's weird. It's like, why are you blocking?

• 38:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And it's not like, oh, sorry, this is off limits. Like no one can go here. No, it was like, oh, strange weather. Come back again, try again another day.

• 38:30Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, that is strange.

• 38:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like the itsy bitsy spider, come back when the rain goes away.

• 38:34Corinne Vien?

  You would think that they would make it an archaeological site or that they would like turn it into a tourist attraction.

• 38:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But that's the thing is also no one knows where the exact location is. So this is where he thinks because of all the like odd being denied access past this point, he's like, maybe it's in this region.

• 38:51Corinne Vien?

  It's in this area.

• 38:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  He felt like he was being purposely prevented from finding the cave. But then now he's like, well, why? So he published this book in 1992 and claimed that the government was covering something up. In fact, he framed this as a major archaeological cover-up, a conspiracy. And so 1992, this is brought back to a much larger audience and the internet's starting to percolate. People are learning about it. And people start to like send requests to the Smithsonian Institute, being like, what the hell's the deal with this? Like you funded this expedition, we want answers. So many other people after reading David's book and like this being on the internet

• 39:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  start gearing up quite literally and heading to the Grand Canyon in search for the cave itself. Finally, in 2000, nearly a century after that 1909 article was published, a representative from the Smithsonian Institute responded to the many requests because they had gotten so many. They were finally like, okay, let's make a statement. This is their statement. "The Smithsonian Institution has received many questions about an article in the April 5, 1909 Phoenix Gazette about G. E. Kincaid and his discovery of a great underground citadel in the Grand Canyon hewn by an ancient race, possibly from Egypt. The Smithsonian's Department of Anthropology has searched its files without finding any mention

• 40:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  of a Professor Jordan, Kincaid, or a lost Egyptian civilization." They also wrote, "The first thing I can tell you before we go any further is that no Egyptian artifact of any kind has been found in North or South America. Therefore, I can tell you that the Smithsonian Institute had never been involved in any such excavations." And sure, many people could look at this story and say, okay, well, the story of the findings was only ever published in one newspaper in 1909.

• 40:45Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, and there was only one guy on an expedition. So like, how does that make total sense?

• 40:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe the journalist didn't do his due diligence in fact checking. Maybe it was fiction, or maybe some like man who came out of the Grand Canyon after days and days of spending time in there, came out with this like delusion and hallucination and brought a story-

• 41:03Corinne Vien?

  I was definitely thinking hallucination.

• 41:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  -to a journalist. Because people have tried to find record of the man, G. E. Kincaid, and no one has had luck. So yeah, maybe it's fake news, maybe it's all fiction.

• 41:16Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 41:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But there are a lot of things that make you question it all and lead many to believe that this is actually a strange government cover up.

• 41:23Corinne Vien?

  Hmm.

• 41:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  First, in the Smithsonian Institute's statement, they referred to themselves incorrectly. I think they wrote "institution," but they're the institute. But then I was like, isn't that kind of like the same?

• 41:36Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 41:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Anyway-

• 41:37Corinne Vien?

  Like the entire institution versus just-

• 41:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  The institute. But apparently it was like big enough where people were like, this is a fake statement by the government and it's not actually the Smithsonian. Okay, but then second, "People who believe in the conspiracy look to the names of the Grand Canyon. If you pull out a map of the Grand Canyon and look at the north side of it, around Area 94 Mile Creek and Trinity Creek, many of the geological formations have names." I'm gonna read these names to you. Tower of Ra, Tower of Set, Osiris Temple, Isis Temple, Chappo's Pyramid, Buddha Temple, Manu Temple, Shiva Temple. Egyptian gods-

• 42:15Corinne Vien?

  Who named it?

• 42:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Hindu deities, but all in this specific area where the mysterious cave is supposed to exist. Other areas of the Grand Canyon like have names that are very mythical in sense, but it's just this region that is very like-

• 42:31Corinne Vien?

  That's super strange.

• 42:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Egyptian Hindu names.

• 42:34Corinne Vien?

  It's like, what's the point of covering it up?

• 42:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We'll get there.

• 42:37Corinne Vien?

  Okay.

• 42:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We'll talk about the conspiracies of it. So researchers who have inquired upon this are met with answers like, oh, early explorers just liked Egyptian and Hindu names, which probably true because a lot of other Grand Canyon names, like it implies that explorers liked ancient mythology. There's an area called like King Arthur's Castle or Excalibur, but it feels so coincidental that this specific area holds Egyptian and Hindu names.

• 42:59Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, although a part of me is like, the treasure hunter part of me is like, well, then it's not there.

• 43:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like it's too on the nose?

• 43:06Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 43:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But also, this specific area around the Egyptian named formations, where the cave is supposed to be, is closed to public access. The park service cites-

• 43:17Corinne Vien?

  Interesting.

• 43:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  -dangerous terrain, unstable cave systems, specifically cave systems, and safety concerns. Official park documentation lists specific restricted zones as "mines" in the River Mile 62 area, which is the exact area described in the 1909 article. Mines.

• 43:36Corinne Vien?

  So if you were to-

• 43:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So there are caves there.

• 43:38Corinne Vien?

  -go down the river, there's just like park rangers randomly stationed that prevent you from getting out?

• 43:42Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I mean, I guess I don't know like the logistics of it, but that's how it sounds.

• 43:46Corinne Vien?

  I feel like people could do it.

• 43:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, but like that's the thing is people can't. So they are being stopped physically, which is also weird.

• 43:53Corinne Vien?

  Being monitored.

• 43:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 43:54Corinne Vien?

  Heavily.

• 43:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes.

• 43:55Corinne Vien?

  If it's such difficult terrain and it's so dangerous and this park is so massive, how would you be able to see everyone there? Has anyone asked the native tribes who were there before? Weren't there, you said there were nine different groups?

• 44:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, so we'll get back to-

• 44:11Corinne Vien?

  I'm curious about like their own storytelling and lore and-

• 44:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So remember the one-

• 44:16Corinne Vien?

  Is this them?

• 44:16Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Remember the first story I said in the very beginning?

• 44:18Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 44:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Where the Hopi people believed like one of their leaders grew a tree-

• 44:24Corinne Vien?

  Yes, to get into the fourth world.

• 44:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  -emerged into our world. Just keep that in mind. Many researchers or explorers or people who have like bought into this conspiracy and are trying to like find the cave have tried to get close but are turned back by rangers. So yes, it's as if the rangers are patrolling the area and guarding it. Which yes, maybe it really is very dangerous and they're just doing their job, but it also feels sus. Like there's so many things about this specific area that feel like, like maybe one by itself, okay, coincidence. All of it on top of each other feels very suspicious. So people who believe in the cover up, believe that the Smithsonian has, over the decades, suppressed evidence of pre-Columbian transoceanic contact because it would upend the current historical consensus of how the Americas were settled.

• 45:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Egyptian artifacts in the Grand Canyon would require a complete rewrite of human history. And like, basically people are comparing it to like the alien disclosure that it's just too big to dump on people and it would-

• 45:24Corinne Vien?

  Come on.

• 45:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. But then people-

• 45:27Corinne Vien?

  At this point, it's like make, I'm like mad again. Now I'm mad at whoever is blaming-

• 45:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Can we all stop making Corinne mad?

• 45:34Corinne Vien?

  Please, don't make me mad.

• 45:36Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We need Mama to be peaceful.

• 45:37Corinne Vien?

  I give birth right here.

• 45:41Corinne Vien?

  But like, who are you to decide whether I can handle something or not? If anything, I'm just gonna care less now.

• 45:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right.

• 45:48Corinne Vien?

  Like, oh, you think it's exciting news? All right, well, whatever I made up in my mind was way more extreme than what you're now dishing out.

• 45:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Also, people have a hard time understanding how a reputable newspaper, the Gazette was in 1909, could publish a front page story that is completely fictional. Unfortunately, the Gazette is long defunct, so finding further records or leads about the story is pretty impossible. But all of these strange facts have led people to believe that there is something within that region of the Grand Canyon that the government is trying to hide. Whether it's actually a cave system with Egyptian artifacts is totally up for date. Some believe that is what it is, but others wonder if it's tied to the origins of the Hopi people because they emerged from the underworld. Did they live in these caves for some time and these passageways? And like, there's maybe, again, this is not confirmed by the Hopi people in any way,

• 46:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  but it's people who have theorized or tried to assign an answer to it. Like, was this their passageway between the underworld and this world?

• 46:47Corinne Vien?

  Mm-hmm. And honestly, given like the extreme weather and stuff, I feel like if the cave system doesn't flood or anything like that and there's good airflow, it probably is pretty temperature controlled and for the most part, a decent place to live.

• 46:59Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Other people wonder if Kincaid misinterpreted a Native American archaeological site for an Egyptian one due to- So I was looking up, in the 1900s, people were obsessed with ancient Egypt and a lot of explorations into like the pyramids and tombs were ongoing at this time. So like, was that in the back of his mind? And he found this cave with a lot of very intricate things-

• 47:24Corinne Vien?

  Right.

• 47:25Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  -that he immediately jumped to Egyptian.

• 47:27Corinne Vien?

  Right.

• 47:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But it could have been just an ancient native finding.

• 47:31Corinne Vien?

  Totally.

• 47:31Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 47:32Corinne Vien?

  And also like, did he even see in person mummies? Or like, did he truly know what Egyptian artifacts and mummification looked like?

• 47:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right. Well, then also like going back to temperature control, like maybe the way the bodies, if there were bodies in this cave,

• 47:46Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 47:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  the way that they decomposed made them appear mummified,

• 47:49Corinne Vien?

  Hmm.

• 47:50Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  but they were actually just decayed in a different way.

• 47:52Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 47:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe the reason it was somewhat erased from history or not further investigated, some people, this is a theory, was that because this land was sacred to the Hopi people? But given our, I've called bullshit on this because given our history and treatment of native people, I can't imagine we would have done something like that. Respect them, respect their caves and not explore it? I don't believe that.

• 48:16Corinne Vien?

  Oh, absolutely not.

• 48:17Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right. We don't have a history of doing that.

• 48:20Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. Hey, everyone, this is Jonathan Van Ness from Getting Better. You know what you believe. Maybe your faith is at the center of your life. Maybe you're still figuring it out. Maybe religion just isn't your thing. Those choices are personal, and in America, they should stay personal. That's why Americans United for Separation of Church and State is fighting for something that affects all of us. The freedom to live as yourself and believe as you choose, so long as you don't harm others. Because religious freedom isn't just about protecting your right to practice or not. And it surely isn't about having one forced government sanctioned religion. It's about protecting your right to say, this is what I believe,

• 49:03Speaker 00

  while your neighbor says, I believe something completely different. And honestly, that's the whole point. If that sounds like the kind of America you want, learn more at au.org/gettingbetter. Because your beliefs are yours and theirs are theirs.

• 49:21Speaker 04

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• 49:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So as of today, this 1909 Grand Canyon Egyptian cave is officially classified as a hoax, but that has not stopped people from looking for it. Hundreds of people have geared up and gone into the Grand Canyon in search of it. And there are a lot of different Reddit threads and forums discussing it. There was one post six months ago by a user, Alternative History, who posted a potential location of the cave along with actual images from the Grand Canyon that shows a cave and an opening up in like the top.

• 50:19Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 50:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And there's actual coordinates. I don't know how he found this photo or like what, but he wrote, "So I was browsing around just for fun, looking to see if I could find a potential cave in the Grand Canyon, and I stumbled upon this. I don't know. I looked at the original story and in the original, Kincaid said the entrance was about 1,486 feet down the cliff of the canyon." And this one's about 1,860, so 400 feet more. And I used the measurements available on Google. What do you guys think? Any potential hero willing to go investigate? And I don't know how to read coordinates, but there's a photo in YouTube.

• 50:55Corinne Vien?

  But it's somewhere in the Grand Canyon.

• 50:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Then, a man named Jerry Wills, who is a self-described healer, explorer and researcher of ancient mysteries based in Arizona, has spoken on the subject and even gone in search of the cave. He did an interview where he discussed the story of the 1909 cave and theorized that it is actually connected to a city of light, which is a place where inner-earth dwellers and extraterrestrials interact.

• 51:20Corinne Vien?

  Interesting.

• 51:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  He claimed that one time while searching for the cave in the Vishnu Temple area, he started experiencing a lot of electronic interference and like weird paranormal type of things. So it makes you wonder, is the government hiding this cave? Because there's some like alien activity or study happening within. Because we know our government loves to keep alien things hush hush. And also like, what if those aren't park rangers who are down at the bottom, but like government officials or men in black?

• 51:47Corinne Vien?

  Oh.

• 51:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But they had to like adorn a park ranger costume.

• 51:51Corinne Vien?

  This kind of reminds me of like people trying to get past the ice wall, fly over the ice wall.

• 51:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right.

• 51:55Corinne Vien?

  To the other civilization that's hidden there.

• 51:57Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 51:58Corinne Vien?

  That one I like kind of buy into a little bit. You wouldn't have to push me far to believe that.

• 52:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Dude, I feel like you like when a conspiracy is like more outlandish. Like you buy into the more outrageous ones.

• 52:09Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 52:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Cause you like the like.

• 52:11Corinne Vien?

  Cause I like the idea of it.

• 52:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, same.

• 52:13Corinne Vien?

  I like living in fantasy.

• 52:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Well, and also we know that aliens love national parks. Like they go hand in hand.

• 52:20Corinne Vien?

  Totally.

• 52:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  They're also celebrating an anniversary today. And so why not the Grand Canyon?

• 52:25Corinne Vien?

  I'll also say this, for anyone who might be like, oh, I don't believe this. Next week, I'm telling two stories and the second one actually has some similarities that are factual, that might, whoa, did you hear me wheeze?

• 52:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 52:41Corinne Vien?

  That might add some credence to the idea that this is a real place.

• 52:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And I think that's the thing is that there are so many caves that have not been explored. I wrote, "There are thousands of unexplored caves within the Grand Canyon. Like literally not a single human has stepped foot inside of them. Only around 355 caves have been documented and even fewer have been mapped, explored or inventoried. And only one of those caves is actually open to the public."

• 53:06Corinne Vien?

  Is that what I'm covering?

• 53:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe. I didn't look at the name of it.

• 53:09Corinne Vien?

  Oh.

• 53:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But if it's open to the public, then yeah.

• 53:10Corinne Vien?

  It is, you can spend the night.

• 53:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, so literally only one of the probably thousands of caves is available to see. So like there are hypothetically thousands of things and historical evidence within these caves that we just have not found. But yeah, ultimately there are no answers, but that's what makes this a mystery and an act of conspiracy theory. What we do know is that there are so many caves that are not explored. And there's a significant amount of the Grand Canyon in general that has not been explored. Archaeological discoveries are being made very slowly in the Grand Canyon. Even in 1996, new ancestral puebloan ruins were discovered. So like, we're still making discoveries.

• 53:52Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  All to say, the Grand Canyon is essentially 277 miles of mystery. And it's possible that those who discovered the 1909 caves have disappeared. What if Kincaid was a real explorer, funded by the Smithsonian, but the discovery made him dangerous? And he was wiped from the history books?

• 54:12Corinne Vien?

  What if those three guys that got out, found themselves in the cave and now they're living there? They're the caretakers of the cave.

• 54:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh.

• 54:19Corinne Vien?

  Once you get in, you never get out.

• 54:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  If you disappear in the Grand Canyon, you're brought into the cave systems. And you become a cave dweller. Whatever you believe, I think we can all agree that the Grand Canyon is vast. It holds many secrets and unknowns. And if you do find yourself standing at the rim, it is likely you will feel so small because it holds knowledge, secrets and history so much bigger than yourself, much bigger than humanity itself.

• 54:43Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 54:43Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Again, the rock layer dates back 1.8 billion years. So we are literally nothing in comparison.

• 54:49Corinne Vien?

  You brought up the fact that we haven't studied the sea much at all. And I feel like this does remind me of that in the sense that it feels like the more you know, the less you know that you, or the less you feel you actually know.

• 55:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes.

• 55:00Corinne Vien?

  Like the more confused you become.

• 55:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There's a philosopher who was like, me, I can't pull who it is, but there's like some type of.

• 55:08Corinne Vien?

  Well, you know how Sabrina feels about philosophy?

• 55:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There's some type of message.

• 55:11Corinne Vien?

  Crimes of episode, which a couple of people got mad about.

• 55:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  It's my own personal experience. I am happy to be proven wrong. If you have studied philosophy and you're not going to challenge my belief system, I'll be friends with you.

• 55:23Corinne Vien?

  If you're chill.

• 55:24Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, but if you look at me and you're like, you're stupid. I don't like when people make you feel stupid. I think that's the real thing.

• 55:31Corinne Vien?

  Keep questioning you.

• 55:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, and I'm like, why can't we just like.

• 55:33Corinne Vien?

  They come into a conversation ready for a fight.

• 55:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  For like a debate.

• 55:36Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 55:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And I'm like, can we just like hang?

• 55:39Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. So, Summer House reunion.

• 55:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, exactly. It was like something about the idea, similar to what you're saying of like, the happiest people are actually like the most naive people because.

• 55:50Corinne Vien?

  Ignorance is bliss?

• 55:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. No, but it was like more grandiose about like the more you know, the like more depressed you become and the like harder it is to comprehend the world.

• 56:01Corinne Vien?

  They say knowledge is power, but knowledge is also kind of a burden.

• 56:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. Like I feel like some of the smartest people are also like the most depressed people.

• 56:08Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 56:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And that's why I'm so depressed.

• 56:11Corinne Vien?

  Cause we're brilliant, we're geniuses. Our big brains.

• 56:14Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  No, but okay, I'm going to briefly talk about some hauntings. There are thousands of stories, thousands of deaths and disappearances, and only the Grand Canyon knows the truth. You can't put that much life and death into one place and expect it to just be quiet. In fact, it's anything but. It's very haunted. You're going to talk about a very specific haunting next week.

• 56:33Corinne Vien?

  Yes, one singular location.

• 56:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes.

• 56:36Corinne Vien?

  With a haunting.

• 56:37Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But here's what I'll share, given the sheer size, its ancient history and the many people who have lived here and died within the canyon walls, it is no surprise that there are ghosts. We already mentioned the spirit of Powell, who is seen in the Grand Canyon and continue to explore in the afterlife. There's also a wailing woman, who is a spirit widely reported along the north rim. She is described as wearing a white dress adorned with blue flowers. She is seen often at night and witnesses report the unmistakable sound of crying. Sometimes it's very like faint.

• 57:05Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 57:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Other times it's like a devastating wail.

• 57:08Corinne Vien?

  Oh, I hate that.

• 57:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Legend says that she was a mother who lost both her husband and son during a fall, during a rainstorm in the canyon.

• 57:16Corinne Vien?

  Oh no, hell no.

• 57:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then I wasn't totally clear on this, but there was a Grand Canyon Lodge Fire on September 1st, 1932. And I wasn't sure if people were like, oh, she's someone who died in that fire? Or if people think she like had something to do with it? Because several witnesses claimed to see her face in the flames.

• 57:37Corinne Vien?

  Like she started the fire?

• 57:38Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Or like.

• 57:39Corinne Vien?

  And was watching it burn?

• 57:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Or did she like try to go in and save people? I don't know. Or did she die in the fire? I don't, I, it's very unclear.

• 57:46Corinne Vien?

  Right.

• 57:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But yes, it is certain that people late at night, should you find yourself on the north rim, you might hear her cries. And a lot of the Grand Canyon hotels actually have their own ghosts. The El Tovar Hotel and Hoppy House has lots of hauntings. It opened in 1905 and is reported to be one of the most paranormal hotspots in the park. There is a man in period clothing with a black hat who wanders hallways and rooms and vanishes when approached. Many believe he's the one who created the hotel. There's also a woman's spirit from the 1930s, who one time frightened a night watchman so bad that he never returned to work.

• 58:18Corinne Vien?

  Damn.

• 58:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Then there's a Hoppy House, which is a traditional hoppy style building that was constructed in 1907, that is haunted by two spirits who run around the building at night.

• 58:28Corinne Vien?

  Ew.

• 58:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But they seem to be having fun. So I think it operates as a gift shop. And so like people will come back in the morning and like gift, like the things are like messed up and moved around. Lights will have been like turned on and off. So I think they're just like benign playful spirits. So the ones that I've just said, they're pretty benign, right?

• 58:44Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 58:45Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But there are some dangerous spirits. We talked about the flesh pedestrians. I'm not going to go in detail about them, but if you want to go on Reddit, there's plenty of stories of people encountering them in the Grand Canyon. There is a spirit that has told people to jump off the rim. Others have literally felt hands pushing them, which is so scary. In the late 1990s, a group of hikers on the remote Thunder River Trail reported seeing a human-like figure moving with impossible fluidity, scaling sheer cliff walls at speeds that no human could achieve.

• 59:16Corinne Vien?

  Ew, I hate that.

• 59:18Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. They tried to take photos, but their cameras like kept failing. So they literally abandoned their hike in fear.

• 59:25Corinne Vien?

  Ew, yeah.

• 59:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  A park ranger on the north rim in the early 2000s reportedly documented footprints that transitioned mid-stride from human prints to large dog prints.

• 59:34Corinne Vien?

  Doggo.

• 59:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And then disappeared entirely at a cave entrance.

• 59:38Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, so maybe the caves aren't the places to live.

• 59:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  River guides near the little Colorado River junction described a figure appearing on inaccessible ledges who looked exactly like someone they worked with. And so they radioed to their colleague and they were like, what are you doing? The colleague was miles away, not on inaccessible face of the cliff. And all of these encounters are consistently accompanied by equipment failures, unusual weather and a crushing sense of dread.

• 1:00:06Corinne Vien?

  It's like the canyon's trying to play tricks on you.

• 1:00:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There's also so many people who have like lost time in the Grand Canyon. They'll be hiking completely fine, hydrated. It's not like they've lost, they're not like in like a bad weather or anything.

• 1:00:18Corinne Vien?

  Day five, no granola bars or water.

• 1:00:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah, when all of a sudden they like lose time and show up miles from where they last were.

• 1:00:25Corinne Vien?

  Dang.

• 1:00:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  So yeah, should you find yourself in the depths of the Grand Canyon, whether during day or night, just remember, you are small, you are nothing, and you are not alone. You are literally within the largest book of history. And sometimes time bleeds through.

• 1:00:44Corinne Vien?

  What a disorienting place.

• 1:00:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Very, but also magical.

• 1:00:48Corinne Vien?

  Very magical from a distance. I love looking at pictures.

• 1:00:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes, the pictures are stunning. I don't know that I'll go back because I've been twice.

• 1:00:56Corinne Vien?

  Yeah, there ain't no way I'm going ever. Isn't the Grand Canyon where they have that like glass? They have like a section of glass that you can like walk out on? So you're just like basically on top. I swear it's the Grand Canyon.

• 1:01:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  There's like, there's buildings like that that have that. I can't do that.

• 1:01:11Corinne Vien?

  Hell no.

• 1:01:11Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I can't do that.

• 1:01:12Corinne Vien?

  I'm not doing that.

• 1:01:13Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Have you seen the newest Final Destination?

• 1:01:15Corinne Vien?

  Nope.

• 1:01:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Pretty sure that's how it opens.

• 1:01:18Corinne Vien?

  I did the skywalk.

• 1:01:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Not in the Grand Canyon, but.

• 1:01:20Corinne Vien?

  The skywalk at the Auckland, New Zealand Tower. I don't know why I did it. I will never do something like that again. But you're on the top of the tower. It's like going to like the Space Needle.

• 1:01:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 1:01:31Corinne Vien?

  You're attached by like a rope around your waist. And you just like walk through this like grate so you can basically see everything. And then they have you lean back or lean forward. So you're like just connected by the rope, just like leaning off the building. Or you can like rappel down the building.

• 1:01:46Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Nope.

• 1:01:46Corinne Vien?

  I just stood there grabbing onto my thing, like attempting to crouch down, but the rope doesn't give you enough slack to even crouch. So I was like attempting to claw my way through.

• 1:01:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Not for us. We are not.

• 1:01:58Corinne Vien?

  No.

• 1:01:58Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Thrill, what is it? Adrenaline junkies?

• 1:02:01Corinne Vien?

  No, we're not.

• 1:02:02Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We're far from. We're couch cushions.

• 1:02:04Corinne Vien?

  We go to haunted houses and that is a thrill for some.

• 1:02:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But we're on the ground.

• 1:02:08Corinne Vien?

  We can exit.

• 1:02:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  We can run for our lives.

• 1:02:13Corinne Vien?

  And the danger is a different type of danger.

• 1:02:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. Maybe you'll get what to call when you like step on a rusty nail.

• 1:02:20Corinne Vien?

  Tetanus?

• 1:02:20Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Maybe we'll get tetanus.

• 1:02:22Corinne Vien?

  We might need tetanus shots.

• 1:02:23Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But that's the fear I'd rather than.

• 1:02:25Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Falling off cliff.

• 1:02:26Corinne Vien?

  I agree.

• 1:02:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:27Corinne Vien?

  But thousands and thousands, millions of people go.

• 1:02:30Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:31Corinne Vien?

  And I have a listener story to share.

• 1:02:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Amazing.

• 1:02:33Corinne Vien?

  This is from our listener Lo, who has quite a few different stories. But I'm going to share a couple that Lo has sent in about the Grand Canyon.

• 1:02:41Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Love it.

• 1:02:42Corinne Vien?

  Okay. In the end of November, 2024, myself and 12 other friends were granted permission to self-support raft the Grand Canyon for 25 days.

• 1:02:53Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Why? So adrenaline junkies?

• 1:02:56Corinne Vien?

  We rented the rafts and we had a company prep all of our food and bathroom supplies. But once we took out on the river, it was just us. And this is the most remote place you will ever believe. Our group has a lot of whitewater experience. And we were all super excited to be off the grid for a month with nothing but each other, a shit ton of beer and a majestic water ahead. I'm not native, nor was anyone on the trip, but we all understood and respected the gravity of just how spiritual and sacred this place was to the native cultures that once existed here.

• 1:03:26Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Snaps for that.

• 1:03:27Corinne Vien?

  That being said, this story is not meant to be disrespectful or insensitive, but rather a reflection of what we all experienced.

• 1:03:34Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Okay.

• 1:03:34Corinne Vien?

  The first week or so, we were rafting fairly chill water, no class five rapids, mostly just two to four. Think not technical, but don't fuck up. The trip was honestly off to a great start. The group was vibing. We were all in great spirits. We felt the vibes were high. The second week, we had about five days of very scary, extremely technical, class five rapids.

• 1:03:56Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's scary. How many classes are there? Isn't that pretty high?

• 1:03:58Corinne Vien?

  I think, isn't that the top?

• 1:04:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Rapid classes.

• 1:04:02Corinne Vien?

  I don't think I've ever heard beyond five.

• 1:04:03Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Six is the.

• 1:04:04Corinne Vien?

  Oh.

• 1:04:05Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  But so, yeah, that's.

• 1:04:06Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:07Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Basically.

• 1:04:07Corinne Vien?

  Low rates, think, do exactly what you're supposed to do, pray to the river gods, because anything is possible and tell your people you love them before you get through.

• 1:04:15Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. No, thanks.

• 1:04:16Corinne Vien?

  And it was during this week that the group started to experience some interesting things. After the first day of big rapids, in the second week, we made it to camp. We camped on a nice, large beach that had massive canyon right behind us.

• 1:04:27Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Probably stunning.

• 1:04:28Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. This was by all means, a fairly normal night. We cooked dinner, we had a few beers. We celebrated not dying, we thanked the river gods, and by about nine PM, I was really tired and I was ready for bed. I decided to head to bed early while my partner and the rest of the group stayed up a little later. The way we were oriented, our tent was maybe 50 feet from camp and 50 feet from the mouth of the slot canyon. That night I fell asleep quickly and I was listening to the sounds of the river and soft conversations around camp. I have no recollection of time, but later that night I was awoken by loud music. Like it was like someone was blasting music from the camp speaker. People were laughing, singing, just general commotion going on. I laid there in my sleeping bag for a bit to see what they're doing.

• 1:05:09Corinne Vien?

  If another rafting group maybe had joined us, which was not really likely because it was super late, it was really dark in, in these dangerous waters. But the noise kept getting louder and the commotion sounded like it was happening at camp. I looked over to my partner to see that they're fast asleep. So I decided to open the tent door to see what on earth was going on. I unzip the tent door and the music became crystal clear. Native drumming, singing, it sounded like dancing in the sand and on the rocks. I scanned out the tent door. It's pitch black. I can't see anyone. There's nobody at camp. Nobody from another group has joined us. The music is so loud at this point, it feels almost like tangible.

• 1:05:48Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Whoa.

• 1:05:49Corinne Vien?

  And it was in this moment that I sat there with my tent door open. I continued to listen to this music for an hour. And I'm not joking, there are different songs being played, people laughing. I can hear conversations, like the party is literally happening right there.

• 1:06:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Literally a bleeding of time.

• 1:06:06Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. After about an hour, it sounded like the drums and the music were going back into the canyon behind our tent. And the music followed, the conversations, the laughing, the people, it all goes into the canyon and then boom, dead silent.

• 1:06:19Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  This is what you were saying when I was describing like the hoppy people, how like when they pass away, they believe everyone goes back to the canyon. Yeah.

• 1:06:26Corinne Vien?

  I zipped up the tent and I laid in my sleeping bag awake for what felt like eternity. I didn't feel scared or threatened, but more like I had a deep understanding and respect for the power of the river. And this was the most spiritual that I've ever felt myself feel. The next morning I woke up, I made myself some coffee and some of the others woke up and we shared our stories. Turns out the three light sleepers of the group, myself and two others, all experienced the exact same thing.

• 1:06:51Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Which is nice, like shared experience. Yeah.

• 1:06:53Corinne Vien?

  And based on where the moon was, we know it all happened at the same time. Throughout the rest of the trip, we would go on to experiences multiple different times. And it always happened days after we had really big scary rafting experiences.

• 1:07:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Interesting. But when it goes back to like the very beginning of this episode where I was talking about like the native people believe if you respect the land, this nature spirits will like help guide you safely.

• 1:07:18Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. She writes, I, I feel I'm only alive because the river sees my respect for her and is allowing safe passage. Okay. And then there's one more story. This is about a spirit guide that we found while rafting. The year before I took this trip, my grandma was diagnosed with cancer. And my mom and myself took the roles of being her primary caregivers. We both live pretty far away from her and we would take alternating weeks to go visit and care for my grandma. She and I have always been very close and I honestly think that we share the same soul. But being able to spend so much time with her strengthened our bond and we were basically at this pretty unbreakable level. One night we were sitting on the floor of her back room, looking at old photo albums and talking about family lore.

• 1:08:00Corinne Vien?

  It was a weirdly lucid night for her, like she was sitting on the floor and she wasn't in pain. But she was kind of sleepy and she was really coherent compared to days prior. And at one point she looked up at me and she starts talking about her days as a cowboy ranch hand. And now listen, this woman was so cool. And she looks me dead in the eye and says, this will not be goodbye. I'm coming back as a bird. Look out for me. This is never goodbye. I hold back my tears. She's so intent on me knowing this and the peace that I could see in her eyes. Let me know that she knew that this was in fact.

• 1:08:33Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Like she had such confidence?

• 1:08:34Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:35Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Wow.

• 1:08:35Corinne Vien?

  What was going to happen. And I told her, I will always look for you and when I go, I can't wait to give you a big hug. She ended up beating cancer. She was a badass and her body was just so exhausted from the chemo that she did end up passing away about a month before I was set to go on this trip to the Grand Canyon. I would always tell her that if she passed before I left, I would make sure to take her on all of my wild adventures. After she passed, I got her necklace and I could wear it.

• 1:08:59Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Oh.

• 1:09:00Corinne Vien?

  And it had a little charm and you could put some ashes in it so she could come with me anywhere.

• 1:09:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  That's amazing.

• 1:09:06Corinne Vien?

  Okay. So back to the Grand Canyon. We're rafting in winter essentially. So it's late November, around Christmas time. It is not warm. No, actually it's fucking freezing. For context, the summertime is when the water in the Grand Canyon is biggest. So think massive waves to navigate, big consequences in the water, lower water. So it's not as big, but it's still definitely scary.

• 1:09:28Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right.

• 1:09:29Corinne Vien?

  From day one, no joke, there was a great blue heron that followed our boat. We took off in the first little small rapid that we approached. I looked to my right and there it was, just sat watching us. And once we cleared the rapid, it would fly down the river and sit there as we approached the next rapid, just watching and waiting for us to pass safely.

• 1:09:47Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Wow.

• 1:09:48Corinne Vien?

  And normally I would just chalk this up to us maybe having some food or being some weird, interesting things for wildlife to look at. Except right before my grandma passed, she told me she'd come back as a bird. And she said, quote, maybe a heron or a crane. The bird never intruded on our camp, never came for food, just watched, waited, headed to the next rapid. I knew it was the same.

• 1:10:10Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Following them the whole time.

• 1:10:11Corinne Vien?

  Yeah. On like a 25 day trip.

• 1:10:12Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:13Corinne Vien?

  I knew it was the same bird because of the same tail feathers that were missing from this bird. And I kid you not, this heron followed us for all 25 days, watching, making sure we're safe. And on the very last day, we watched it fly up river and disappear into the canyon. I knew deep in my soul that this was her.

• 1:10:32Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Wow, that's really beautiful.

• 1:10:34Corinne Vien?

  Thank you for being a safe space to bring spooky creepies up and I will see you on the other side. Love, Lo.

• 1:10:40Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Lo. Those are two such incredible, beautiful encounters that would make, if you are an adrenaline junkie or a thrill seeker and love being in national parks and out in like the outdoorsy area, like these stories would make you want to go to the.

• 1:10:55Corinne Vien?

  Right.

• 1:10:55Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  To the Grand Canyon.

• 1:10:56Corinne Vien?

  I mean, it's also like you get a safe passageway from like your own ancestral spirit guide. And then also your respect for the land is like bringing forth communication with like the spirits before you.

• 1:11:08Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Right. Damn. Yeah. I'm so curious of how many people who have camped many nights in the Grand Canyon have heard similar sounds.

• 1:11:16Corinne Vien?

  Right. Cause it's amazing that Lo was not the only person. That like half the group.

• 1:11:21Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:22Corinne Vien?

  Heard it.

• 1:11:22Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Damn. And there are so many more mysteries to unpack, which is why this is going to be a two-part episode. And next week, Corinne, you will.

• 1:11:30Corinne Vien?

  Walk you through a disappearance and then an opportunity to stay in a cave overnight.

• 1:11:38Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  A haunted cave.

• 1:11:39Corinne Vien?

  That is haunted.

• 1:11:39Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yes. Love it. And thank you to everyone who's been a part of our community for, whether you've been here a day or a week or all nine years, no matter what, like we're just so grateful that we get to do this.

• 1:11:54Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:54Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  And that you're here with us for the journey.

• 1:11:57Corinne Vien?

  And I feel like next year, it being 10, we have to do something big.

• 1:12:00Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Yeah. What are we, what are we?

• 1:12:01Corinne Vien?

  I don't know, pitch ideas, guys. We've got one year.

• 1:12:04Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  I feel like we should record it from somewhere really cool.

• 1:12:06Corinne Vien?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:06Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  A haunted place.

• 1:12:08Corinne Vien?

  Let us know. What do you think?

• 1:12:09Sabrina Deana-Roga?

  Give us recommendations. Where are we going and where are you joining us? Thank you again. Thank you for being here. If you want episodes one week early and ad-free, you can join us on Patreon. There's so much bonus content over there as well. Please rate and review us wherever you listen to your podcasts. And also please keep telling your friends, family, strangers, ghosts about us because we do have a lot of spirits who listen and we love you all.

• 1:12:32Corinne Vien?

  And thank you to Jamie Ryan, who edits and produces our podcast. And we will see you on the other side.

• 1:12:45Speaker 01

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