A very professionally run tourist operation, and a wonderfully informed and expansive pilot who managed the dual tasks of successfully keeping us aloft while deciphering and answering our inane and long-winded questions.
And coping with our infantile exclamations.
Yes, we were excited.
All of us.
My partner and I, and the 3 other passengers - a generational trio of grandmother, mother and daughter, all on their first helicopter flight.
We had a beautiful blue sky crisp winter morning for our tour.
That moment the chopper passed from the forested plateau over the rim of the canyon was, alone, worth the cost of the flight.
My mind was then scrambled by the sheer vastness of the canyon below and around us - the northern side is evidently higher than the southern side - and the breathtaking beauty of the canyon walls and formations, the colours, the light and the shadows.
And the teal green of the serpentine Colorado way down at the very bottom.
Time evaporated as we snaked along the river, rose above then flew over the northern rim - where we saw a herd of bison in a snow covered landscape - then re-entered the canyon further westward. I couldn't believe that we had been flying for as long as we had when we gently settled back on to the tarmac back at Maverick central.
Sensational, and a video of the flight available just in case you want to relive it.