Utah National Parks and Monuments

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Oct. 5, 2011

Our Utah adventure began on Sept. 5, 2011 when we left Evansville, IN and traveled to Las Vegas, NV. We then traveled to St. George, UT via shuttle to Dixie College where we spent the night in a refurbished dormitory. We had a private room and bath and met our group the next morning. We were late in arriving because of some travel difficulties. We met our tour directors, Chrystal and Marc Deshowitz. Chrystal was in charge of the logistics and helped by her husband, Marc. Marc is a geologist and this proved to be extremely important on our journey to see the National Parks of Utah.


Our first full day of our adventure began with breakfast with our group and meeting the tour directors, Chrystal and Marc Deshowitz. Chrystal organized the activities and Marc gave many of the so-called "geo-moments". He promised to repeat the names of the rocks, formations and sites multiple times throughout the journey. We began with our first field trip to the outskirts of St. George where we were introduced to the Navajo rock formation. This is the one that was nearly constant throughout all the sites we visited.


We drove to Snow Canyon State Park and were introduced to the rock formations. Marc briefed us on plate tectonics, volcanic activity and erosion as principals involved in what we were seeing. Marc told us how lacoliths were formed. So many new geological terms were introduced. They write books on this, you know.

After lunch, we listened to a lecture by Dr. Alder on the history of St. George, Utah and the Mormon influence on the settling of most of Utah. Afterwards we toured the city of St. George and saw the sites. St. George was founded by the Mormons and today is a city of 80,000. It is home to many famous people. It is also very clean and now emphases the arts, golfing and retirement. The evening meal was memorable for we ate at the Chuck-o-Rama. This was buffet style as were most of our meals.

The next day we set out for Zion National Park. We learned about the Colorado Plateau and many new multicolored rock strata which are beautiful. The pictures just can't capture the beauty of it all.

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Photos

College Inn at Dixie State College
College Inn at Dixie State College

Stan & Linda hiking trail in Snow Canyon
Navajo Sandstone formations, lacoliths, volcanic lava tubes and interesting flora enhanced the beautiful scenery.

Fault in lacolith
Lacolith is what was once a subterranean lava dome that was once covered with other layers which have now eroded to expose the lava dome.

Snow Canyon
Running water and wind are the main erosion forces that form the canyons and rock formations.

Zion National Park
Every view was breathtaking - so much beauty.

Zion National Park
I could name the strata but just admire the beauty of it all

Zion National Park
The Virgin River runs through it.

Zion National Park
The Virgin River

Zion National Park
The park's lodge is almost as beautiful as the enviornment