8/23 - Canyonlands National Park

I woke up this morning reluctantly. After seeing three national parks in a row, I felt a bit tired. It would be nice to have a day off here, I thought. But the urge of following the original plan was stronger at this point, so I sit up and put myself together, got ready to keep going.

The agenda for today is Canyonlands National Park. From my tour book I knew it is a very large park, and there is no way to see it, even at a high level, in one day. So to be more precise I was going to the "Island in the Sky" district of Canyonlands National Park. This park consists of several districts and there is no way to go from one district to another from within the park, and their corresponding entrances are hundreds of miles apart. So I chose the most visited (and the easiest to visit) district, just to get a feel of this park.

I drove first east bound on I-70 and then south bound on US-191. This part of the country is also sparsely populated, and the scenery along the way pretty much resembles what I saw in western films. These pictures probably will make you feel the same way.

Taking the road between tall standing rocks...

...into wilderness with desert-like plantation...

...with an old train stopped by the road....

...This is just like in the western movies.

When I reached the gate for the Island in the Sky district, something weird came up. My National Park pass was not there in my wallet. I had no idea where else it could be. It just evaporated. So the cost of entrance fee to national parks would add up to my travel bill from this point on.

SmallWorld in front of the huge Mesa Arch

The most popular point to see in this district is the Mesa Arch. This is a point where a stone arch sets in front of a cliff and you can peer through the arch to see the canyon below. It is also a point where thousands of pictures have been taken. And of course, I had to add a few to the photo bibliography to show that I was there.

The trail leading to the Mesa Arch is a short but difficult one. It is difficult not for walking, but for recognizing where the trail is. The whole park is mostly a barren land to me, and it looks extremely similar in every direction. To preserve its original scene, the trails are not paved nor marked with signs and arrows. Instead, they use rock piles to mark the trail, and one should follow the path from one pile of rocks to another. These rock piles blend into the surrounding very well, and it is easy to ignore them and get lost. But it was interesting following these signs to me.

These rock piles (There are two in this picture) are the only signs available for the trail. It is easy to lose them in the world of a single color, and therefore lose the direction.

At the Mesa Arch there were three groups of visitors. They were helping each other taking pictures when I arrived. Seeing no one coming after me, I had no option but asked one gentleman to take pictures for me. He had been busy taking pictures for others before me, as everyone asked him for the same favor. He became a bit annoyed but still helped me out. Here are the pictures at the Mesa Arch.

Mesa Arch from the distance

...Coming close and peering through below the arch...

...and seeing a huge valley down below...

A slightly different view

Me at the Mesa Arch

After he helped me out with the pictures we started a conversation. Interestingly he was also from LA. So I told him about my trip and the transfer from USC to UF. When I finished, he looked at me with a guess-who-you-are-talking-to look on the face, and reached into his pocket for the wallet. Seconds later he showed me an old ID saying "USC faculty". Yes he is a professor at my old school. This was the first time I saw a faculty ID. What a small world this is!

The Grand View Point

After visiting the famous Mesa Arch I continued on to the south most point in the Island in the Sky district, and there is the Grand View Point. The whole Island in the Sky district is a high rising plateau overlooking the rest of the Canyonlands, and the Grand View Point provides one of the most magnificent view. I had to take four pictures and put them together to show you the whole picture. As you may notice from the picture, the rim of the valley down there is white, and hence the primitive road next to the rim was named "White Rim Road". It is possible to descend from the Island in the Sky down to the valley and drive on those roads if one has a four-wheel-drive car. It sounded like a great adventure to me. The roads down there looked distant and lonely, just like another world from atop the island. I did see one or two cars one those roads. However, I couldn't attempt this drive with my Whity.

The panorama at the Grand View Point

Zoom in to the big hole in the valley. It would be a great adventure to go down there.

I walked along the trail from the Grand View Point a little bit to get different views into the valley. The sun was brutally hot by noon time, and I had to retreat to my car after just a short walk.

In the afternoon I checked out several other view points. However, it was too hot that I decided to finish the day at Canyonlands earlier and moved on to Moab, where I planned to spend the night. A few more shots here:

Another view into the canyon.

Yet another view.

The narrow neck of the Island in the Sky district.

Illustration of the "Island in the Sky". It is a plateau connected to the outside world only by the very thin "neck". If the neck is broken, the great views here will be no longer accessible.

Upheaval Dome features a big hole on top of the dome. It is a place to observe all the tilted and displaced rock layers.