CANYON DE CHELLY & THE GRAND STAIRCASE

Navajo Beauty: CANYON DE CHELLY

As shown on the map to the right, Canyon De Chelly (pronounced Dah Shay) is located in Chinle Arizona, close to the northeast corner of the state, and on the edge of the Defiance Plateau. The canyon is beautiful, and one formation, the famous Spider Rock, shown on the right, is fantastic. However, Canyon De Chelly is a national monument and not of the same class as the other national parks which make up RRC. As you can see on the map, there are really three canyons in the Canyon De Chelly National Monument. In addition to their scenic value, the canyons hold a number of major cliff dwellings and ruins. To the right and below is a photo of one of these ruins, Antelope House Ruins. The most famous of the ruins is Whitehouse. De Chelly is on a Navajo Reservation and the country around it is farmed by the Indians. It is truly beautiful country as you travel north of De Chelly for the first fifty miles.

So Much Variety: THE GRAND STAIRCASE

The Grand Staircase and the Grand Staircase National Monument are two very different things. Many do not realize it, but the first step, the "lowest" step, in the staircase is the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. The staircase exhibits some very interesting characteristics. The top of the "lowest" step, the Grand Canyon north rim, and the top of the "highest" step, the Bryce Canyon south wall, are at nearly equal elevations. How can that be since the steps themselves are very high? After each step, the ground slopes downward toward the north until it reaches the next step. In some cases the slope amounts to thousands of feet.

Tt is probably impossible to view the whole staircase at once. You might try it from an aircraft, say a little south of the Grand Canyon North Rim, but then to view the last step, which is the southeast "wall" of Bryce Canyon, would require excellent eyesight, because that wall would be about two hundred miles north of your aircraft and most likely would not be visible from your window. However, if you skip the first two steps, the North Rim and the Vermilion Cliffs of the Paria Plateau, you can see the rest of the staircase with the naked eye. Drive north from the Grand Canyon about seventy miles. Just as you are about to "drop off" the Kaibab Plateau, Arizona has built a place to view the staircase. From this location you can see all of the remainder of the staircase. Your first view will be of the deep red Moenave and Kayenta sandstones. Set back some distance are the White Cliffs, huge cliffs of white Navajo Sandstone. The next step up is the gray sloping cliff of the Morrison Formation. One beautiful last step and we are at the top. This step is in the pink Bryce Canyon formation.

Of course, not everything you see is enclosed in the Grand Staircase National Monument. But enjoy your view, it was just as beautiful before Clinton's election ploy. What that ploy did was remove for all times the trillions of tons of coal and possibly billions of barrels of oil from use by American citizens. These minerals are in the Kaiparowits Plateau, included in the northern end of the National Monument. The Kaiparowits Plateau, or Fifty Mile Mountain, is dark and foreboding, most of it is anything but beautiful. So obviously the goal of the ploy was more than to preserve beauty, it was to pacify some extreme environmentalist. Please, do not misunderstand what I'm saying. There is much beauty in the Monument. However, I've chosen to cover the interior of the Monument under the heading of "Escalante Country, Cottonwood Canyon, and Paria River Wilderness".

The photo to the right above is of the White Cliffs, with the Gray and Pink Cliffs in the background, three of the steps in the staircase. The bottom photo is one of the Cockscomb. This major west sloping uplift is in the Grand Staircase and runs north and south through southern Utah and northern Arizona for over sixty miles. It crosses US 89 midway between Page Arizona and Kanab Utah.