Well we're finally in Utah so it is as weird wonderful changeable wild rocky green yellow beige purple red ochre as I thought. And two months ago I didn't know I wanted to come here. Good thing I created this desire so I could fulfill it. This is one place that needs pictures.
We're spending a couple of nights in strange Torrey, outside the Capitol Reef national park. We went through at least a dozen different landscapes today. It changes about every 30 or 40 miles. Aliens from several different planets must have created Utah. We went through long open areas with scrubby low-to-the ground desert vegetation and red rock mesas and strange rock columns off in the distance. Then we would pass through the red rocks up close on each side of the narrow road, very little green. Then the rocks changed to beige and became what I called rock rubbish piles. Just piles of fallen rock everywhere. Rand figured I wouldn't like it because it was just too disorderly. Later it was flat again, then the rocks became white, then we hit Glen Canyon and it was spectacularly panoramic, over the Colorado. Which has been drained by Las Vegas, right? A ranger at Natural Bridges this morning told us that when the river dried up, so did the camping there. Later the land changed again to these large gray piles that we couldn't figure if they were rock or softer shale? They looked like piles of gravel for sale in a quarry. Then the turned lighter cream colored and finally were ringed in large purple circles, like tie-dyed rock piles. See how strange?
Oh, and there was this:
1 comment:
Strange Torrey huh? 8-)
The grey and purple clay/shale/rock you are seeing is bentonite, it is a strange substance alright, when wet it is both very sticky and very slippery. It is a rock but the sun affects the surface and makes it crumbly. It's used as 'mud' in drilling because it both lubricates and seals the drill hole. Hope you enjoy your visit.
Bob Palin
Torrey, Utah
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