Due to recent events and a state-sponsored religious (LDS) holiday, I decided to pull a Chris. On a whim, I took off and drove, and drove a lot. I saw the three National Parks in Utah that I had yet to see in three days, with the fourth day left to drive home.
Now my collection of NPS map/guides is bigger than ever. Quick question for you all. I have just recently started to collect these as a practical way to have a free/reusable/informative souvenir from my travels. Would it be lame to get ones that I’ve already been to by mail? I’ve been to more parks, but I didn’t start to keep the map/guide until the last few years. Just a thought. OK, on to the pictures.
Bryce Canyon
Bryce is great, though I was somewhat disappointed. I guess it can’t match the lower steps in the Grand Staircase (Zion and Grand Canyon). Plus, who likes Paleogene stratigraphy anyways?
The biggest problem with Bryce is it’s almost to vibrant, and it is actually hard to take a picture in direct, full-strength sunlight. Also, once you’ve seen part of it, there are so many hoodoos, fins, spires, and intricate features that it has a crowd effect and it all looks similar. Most of my pictures look either 1) the same or 2) overexposed. Like I’ve said before… I need a new (working) camera!!!
The night I was there I met another lone traveler (who just happened to be my campground neighbor) and we saw an astronomy show together. It was awesome, and we got along real well, though it was strange to have a multi-hour conversation with a person without looking at them. It was really dark for the star show and the subsequent telescope view party. I thought something could happen between us, a brief NP romance, but once we got back to camp, she dropped a couple ‘my boyfriend’ bombs and I got the message and went to bed. The morning hike, I left early, before she awoke, and only the moon was there to greet me.
The main hike I went on was the Queen’s Garden/Navajo Loop, which was awesome. It was great. I liked it. It was a nice hike. It was not, as I had heard in the park, “The greatest hike in the world,” but again, I thought it was awesome.
This is part of the Navajo loop called Wall Street. A few years ago, a section of it became unstable and collapsed. It easily could have killed or injured many poor, unsuspecting souls, but it was a lucky break as no one was there at the time, though many were there the day I went. Thank goodness the real Wall Street is nothing like that…
The one thing Bryce has, like almost every other great National Park, is the expansive, breathtaking view. Bryce has the 2nd best view (measured by daytime distance of sight and lack of light pollution) of anywhere in the US, first place belongs to Great Basin NP area, where I work!
Mid day thursday, I left Bryce and moved on to the next park. On the way to Capitol Reef, I decided to take a side road called ‘Hells Backbone.’
It was hell, alright. The road sucked. It was so washboarded, I thought Carl was going to shake out of gear. The view was nice though, but I would not recommend it.
Capitol Reef
Capital Reef, as many have claimed, is the hidden jewel of the Southern Utah NP system. It is probably the least famous, but it is worth a trip, I can assure you. Of course, it can’t be a national park on the Colorado Plateau without deep overlooks into entrapped meandering river systems.
Here is the Reef. So, why the strange name? Well, a reef is a nautical term meaning a high impasse. These long ridges (above) reminded people of a reef. These ridges are formed from a 90-mile long monocline, and it is the crest of this monocline that creates the relief for the reef.
Now for the ‘Capital’ part. The highest stratigraphic unit in the area is our old friend, the Navajo sandstone. As in other places, it tends to weather in rounded outcrops, and this reminded people of the US Capital building. Can you see it? I guess it fits.
This is the famous rock, known as the Castle.
The colors here are impressive, and quite interesting. The reds are Fe oxidized sediments, the whites/light tans are bleached Fe oxidized sediments (i.e. the Fe has been removed, by reduced groundwater or hydrocarbons), and the greens and greys are reduced Fe sediments. The big, high cliffs in this park (also in Canyonlands and Zion) with the vertical, fractured look is the Jurassic Wingate Sandstone, an aeolian unit like the Navajo ss. In Zion, the Navajo is the top and much thicker, the Wingate is the bottom of the cliffs.
Now, check out this color. This is Navajo ss again, but it’s a natural golden dome for all you Fighting Irish fans, called The Golden Throne. Any guesses on this color? I was clueless. Well, it turns out that a sliver of the overlying Carmel formation marine mudstone/marl is above it, and it has stained the dome golden. How cool is that?
That evening, I went for a drive and enjoyed the scenery. I should mention that most of the people there were non-US American tourists who have maps. I didn’t ever get to see a geology talk while I was there, but I did pass a budding Mediterranean Geoscientist who is into Igneous and Metamorphic Petrology.
Well, if I was into that, Capitol Reef wouldn’t have been my first choice. Oh well.
As I returned home to my campsite, the local rainstorm yielded possibly the coolest rainbow ever. First of all, it was a double rainbow. Also, the low angle of the sunlight creates a glow off the canyon wall, with the grey of the sky and the green of the trees for contrast. Again, I just wish my camera worked!
That night, with thunder and lightning threatening to cut it short, I went to an awesome talk about starting fires from scratch. So, you’ve seen the method with a stick, another stick as a base, and a bow to spin the stick? So, we did that, but then, we did a giant version, with a 2×4, a 2″ diameter branch, and a 20′ long rope. It was so cool!
In the morning, I took a short hike, my only real hike, in the park to see Hickman Bridge. This is a natural bridge, not an arch–the difference being that a bridge is carved out by running water underneath, and an arch does not have this, and is usually carved by wind or other weather.
Better than the bridge, I thought, was the scenery leading up to the bridge.
My plan, for that day, was to drive up to Cathedral Valley, which is supposed to have the best geology, including great monoliths and evaporite diapirs. Before I left, I noticed that the road was 4×4, so I will have to do that another time. This trip was the first time Carl’s non 4×4 has cause an issue. I still think that’s OK, because the 27-30 mpg I got on this trip was more important to me. Besides, I still saw a lot of great things. Instead, I drove south to see the rest of (the southern and eastern sections) the reef. Here you can see the Mancos shale and it’s sandstone tongues, which is always neat to see.
Here, again, is the reef, sticking up on end. This is about the highest amount of deformation you’ll see in any of the Colorado Plateau NPs.
That afternoon, I drove through Glen Canyon NRA on my way to Canyonlands NP. This was the first glimpse of something national park-ey. I hope it gets better than that!
On the way was Newspaper Rock, a famous and terrific petroglyph site.
Canyonlands
Canyonlands is hard to describe. Most other parks have a signature theme or picture. Yosemite and Zion, it’s the steep-walled canyon. Grand Canyon, it’s the expansive and deep canyon. Reineer, Lassen, Crater Lake, Rocky Mountain, etc., it’s the mountain(s). Canyonlands is just… awesome. It’s a little of everything, the only problem is the convoluted landscape makes it hard to get around. There are two main parts: the southern Needles district, and the northern Island in the Sky. There is no direct route between them, you have to drive all the way around, past Moab and Arches, over 100 miles before it’s said and done. I briefly went to the Needles, but I wanted to see Island In the Sky.
Here is a pic from the main Grand View Point, Island in the Sky. I guess, the best way to explain this is to say it’s an incredibly wide canyon, 20 plus miles in places, where the Green River and the Colorado River meet. It’s such a wide canyon, it does not even look like a canyon. In a sense, you are on a plateau, but it does not look like you are on a plateau.
Only in rare places, like here at the Green River Overlook, can you actually see the carving agent, the river. The White Rim Sandstone (shallow marine Permian Cutler Formation) is what you are looking at, tracing every detail of the erosion.
That evening, I stayed at Grand View Point to watch the sunset, going off-trail to see these three cliffs. You know you want to go here… can I suggest Super Fantastic Trip II?
The only problem with waiting until sunset to go back to the trail and your car is this guy I met. By my underestimate, this Black Widow was the size of a VW Bus.
Here’s what the three cliffs look like in the morning.
The coolest thing from the Island in the Sky is a place called Monument Valley, an inner gorge full of spires, fins, and hoodoos much like Bryce, but in my mind even cooler looking. If you look closely, you might see a faint jeep trail. There is a 100+ mile loop around Island in the Sky, but again, I didn’t want to risk Carl on this road. I HAVE to go back to see this! According to the rangers, you can only get to Monument Valley via rock climbing or on the river, but the road would be a good way to get closer. By the way, these roads were put in during the cold war and the Uranium boom in this area before this was a national park. Luckily, they found very little here, unlike Moab. Below the cliff-forming Wingate is the Chinle Formation, which has reduced mudstones that are good targets for Uranium ore. The old mining roads here have turned into trails and the 100 mile loop.
The main reason I was most excited to come to this park was Upheaval Dome. It is a circular object that has long been debated as either a salt diapir or a bolide impact (some even postulated a volcanic origin). The only thing that is certainly agreed upon is this is a deeply dissected structure. No Iridium anomaly or meteorite fragments have ever been found, but no similar salt doming have been found nearby. There are salt ridges in the Arches region, but no doming. Any extraterrestrial material could have eroded away, or, the bolide could have been a comet. It is certainly still a mystery, but a recent paper has documented shocked quartz, possibly confirming the impact theory.
If all that wonderfulness was not enough for you, we have this. Right before I left, I noticed this… and boy, that looks familiar…
Is this not the spitting image of half dome? It’s called mini Half Dome, but there is no good trail or sign for it. I think it is really, really cool. And, if they popularized it, more attention would be paid to it and the park. It’s actually easy to miss, as I did driving by it several times before it hit me. I hearby declare this should be called: “The Half Dome of the Canyonlands.”
I mean, how many people see this:
Thinking of this:
When this:
In reality looks a lot closer to this:
But no one knows about it.
After that, I returned to the SLC last night, braving heavy rain and hail while traveling over the San Rafael Swell. In case you are unaware, the Swell is a state rec area that is great, it’s another Larimide structure like Capitol Reef but no one knows about it. So, if you want the great canyons with views and no people, that is the place to go.
So, I do have to close by talking about my only companion, Carl. I was apprehensive to travel so far by myself, but it was great. The trip to SF and Yosemite showed me I could do it, and now I feel I can go anywhere. I actually used Carl’s camper shell for it’s stated purpose, and that worked very well. Being alone is OK for me, right now. In fact, I’m gonna go see a movie this afternoon by myself, also a first.
Thanks Carl!
To wrap up, here is my new Utah park list:
1a. Canyonlands
1b. Zion
3. Capital Reef
4. Bryce
5. Arches
I know, you’re thinking, “What? The most famous park in Utah is in last place?” Well, I can assure you it’s not a punker than thou thing. I just don’t think it’s that great. It has a few famous rock formations, but it’s just not better than the other four. Now, don’t get me wrong, a bad NP is better than 99% of life. Also, my last Zion trip was ESS 133 with Ray, and I think that if I go again as a tourist instead of a student, It might take number one. And I will say that Grand Canyon and Glacier beats them all!
Next, I got to go to a few more parks, to name a few: Guadalupe, Carlsbad Caverns, Crater Lake/Sequoia (it’s been too long), Denali, Dinosaur, Badlands, Great Smokey Mountains, Acadia, Rocky Mountain, Olympic, Rainier, but I have a feeling that Joshua Tree might be next!
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