Day 12 - From arches to canyons

Water, ice, extreme temperatures, lightning and an unstable salty surface have created the arched rocks of Arches National Park. On a beautiful day like today, those rough, pure, almost violent powers of nature that have caused erosion for over 100 million years, are hard to imagine.

Over 2,000 arches were counted in this 310 km2 large natural park, the largest collection of sandbows in the world. But this is just a snapshot. Every day new ones are formed, while existing arches are destroyed. These arches are a window on the time, on the time right now. Because tomorrow it will all be different.

Apart from the arches there are also rock formations, peaks, spikes and balancing stones.

We start a walk along Park Avenue, named after the street in New York.

The high Themonoliths indeed remind us of the New York skyscrapers. Fortunately, this causes some shadow because temperatures are rising high today. There is a heat warning into effect and we all have to drink enough water and eat salty snacks. We have to bring our own bottle of water because, unlike the real Park Avenue, there are no exquisite (and also expensive) hotels and/or bars. But we have a wonderful view of the place. The morning sun plays with the colors on the rocks, which color reddish.

You also have wonderful views at the Windows section. The windows on the world around us.

Via South Window and North Window we reach Turret Arch. Unimaginable how big some of these 'windows' are. Sandstone is of course very fragile, so it easily erodes. Some holes or arches are only a meter, but the largest arch has a span of 88 m. At Double Arch we take a break. The two arches are artisically eroded. On the stem of a bushy tree, we find some cooling in the shade of the leaves. We could sit here for hours because, despite the many tourists, the place feels relaxed.

A little further, Balanced Rock takes a leap with gravity. As his name suggests, a giant rock balances on  a much smaller one.

Delicate Arch is a 16 meter high detached arch and the most famous monument of the national park and an important symbol for the state of Utah. He is on license plates and stamps.

The loose sand and slightly larger pieces of rock actually form the coffin of collapsed arches. Some arches live longer than their time, others collapse prematurely.

The irony of these arches is that bows that are built by human hands, are an example of construction, these arches created by nature and formed into unique pieces are a sign of destruction.

The history of the arches began about 300 million years ago. At that time the whole area was flooded several times. When the water evaporated or the climate became drier,  the salt remained. This salt accumulated for years and in some places even layers of many hundreds of meters were formed. This salt layer was later covered with remains of floods and winds. This sand slowly transformed into tick layers of rocks. Salt is unstable when under pressure. The salt bed could not withstand the pressure of the overlying layers, causing vertical tearing in the rock layer above it. In these cracks, the ice caused expansion which made the rock to crumble. The loose stones were caught by the wind. During wetter periods it rained in the area and the grooves were eroded by flowing water. The process was accelerated when the Coloradoplateau was pushed up in the period from ten to five million years ago. The water filled the gaps so deep that the underlying salt was reached. When it was washed away, two valleys were formed in the area.

The arches that we admire today will all know the same end: total destruction. What created them will also destroy them. When? No-one knows. But there will be a time that no arch will be left standing. Tomorrow will be different from today. These are the windows on the world. On our world. On the world we know today.

Yesterday we already had a beautiful view of the Canyonlands from Dead Horse Point.  Canyonlands NP is 1,349 km2 in size. The park is a still unspoilt area of ​​canyons and table mountains eroded by the Colorado River, the Green River and their confluents in the Coloradoplateau. It offers impressive views over the course of the Colorado River. The rivers divide the park into four districts: the Island in the Sky, the Needles, the Maze and the rivers themselves. Despite the limited vegetation, wild animals live in the Canyonlands such as coyotes and the bighorn sheep. Due to the big difference in summer and winter temperatures, it is not an interesting area for human exploitation. These climate changes are related to the location: the park is located 1200 to 2400 meters above sea level and there is very little rainfall. The nickname for the park is therefore 'high desert'. Yet, thick clouds get together when we start our jeeptour through the park. Of course we get rain in the desert today, I have a patent on that J. In the event of heavy rainfall, the otherwise green Colorado river turns red due to the deposition of rock. Canyonlands and Arches is the area where John Ford has filmed numerous western movies with John Wayne. The trend-setting Stagecoach was recorded here. But not only western films were filmed here. Also Mission Impossible, Indiana Jones and Star Wars thanks to the moon landscape. 

We start in Horseshoe canyon in the Maze where murals were found. These dates from about 7,000 years ago. 

The Maze district is difficult to reach and driveable so you can only come with jeeps and maybe also with a guide. It is, as the name suggests, a canyon labyrinth. Through the canyons, we drive over primitive roads towards Island in the Sky. We drive past Dead Horse Point and stand at the place where it all happened in Thelma and Louise. Here we find fossils in rocks. The highly layered rocks go back for many years even before the dinosaurs era. Also bones and footprints from dinosaurs were found. While it's raining again, we find in Island in the Sky, Mesa Arch, technically not an arch but a bridge that was eroded by water streams. A deep-colored rainbow appears in the distance. 

Through winding roads with beautiful views,  we drive further and further up towards the Neck from which you have a beautiful view of Shafer Canyon. These ultra-narrow winding roads make it extra exciting, as the ravines next to the track are deep and there is obviously no fence. Where the narrow roads are winding up today, outlaws like Billy the Kid and Butch Cassidy fled at the time. The canyons were almost impenetrable to those who did not know their way. And hence the perfect shelter and escape route for our friends. From the Neck we have a beautiful wide view at sunset. Canyonlands has not revealed all its secrets to us, because it is too big, but what an incredible powerful nature this is.