Visitors at Grand Canyon National Park Wednesday found themselves shocked to find a park empty of rangers and employees following a U.S. government shutdown earlier this week.

Jon Kelley, who traveled from Salem, Oregon to visit the park, told The Associated Press people are just driving through, “there was no stop for the van I was in and no checking on any of us.”

“This has never happened in my life,” he also said.

A shutdown contingency plan released by the park service late Tuesday said parks will generally remain accessible to visitors. Parks without “accessible areas” will be closed, and sites currently open could close if damage is done to park resources.

A former corpsman in the U.S. Navy, Kelley is also an experienced hiker, who says he depends on forest professionals for up-to-date knowledge and tips.

“I can't imagine a park especially this big, running open like it is with no rangers. It’s to me a safety issue,” he said.

Thursday is day two of the shutdown, and Congress remains at a standstill.

Democrats are demanding any bill to reopen government save health care funds. Republicans say they're willing to have talks about health care, but not now.

President Donald Trump is seizing on the shutdown as an opportunity to reshape the federal workforce and punish detractors.

The administration is threatening mass firings of workers and suggesting “irreversible” cuts to programs and services important to Democrats.

The aggressive approach coming from the Trump administration is on par with what certain lawmakers and budget observers feared if Congress failed to do its work and relinquished control to the White House.