Jumping About 2,000 km Northeast – Red Flowers

With a sunny Sunday at our disposal, and being tired of winter (only half the monster snowfall has melted) we decided to bask in as close to the tropics as we could. Therefore a visit to the Niagara Parks Commission greenhouses at Niagara Falls, Ontario was made. Warm, colourful, quiet (especially for a Sunday), what more could you what without involving airfares.

The displays are almost set up for the three-week Easter display and it gave us a real break from the snow and cold.

I pulled out some images of red/pink flowers from the bunch I took. The fourth and fifth ones are very small. Each of these flowers is less than 1 cm (about 3/8 inch for our American friends) across and has a tiny drop of water at the centre. These extreme closeups were done using a specialized closeup lense (Raynox DCR 250) on the FZ30.

Sorry about the lack of names. Enjoy.

More Dead Trees

These dead trees are in various locations within Arches National Park, just North of Moab Utah. The locations are (roughly) as follows:
1, 2, and 3. Near Triple Arch.
4. Along the West wall of the Park Avenue "Trail".
5. North end trail to the devils Garden, just at the turnoff to go to Navajo Arch.
6. Taken from the Park Avenue Trail, looking at the iconic "Organ" formation.

Dead Trees (1)

The desert can be unforgiving. Trees can grow but the casualty rate is high. That said, the casualties have a certain character that give the desert a kind of beauty.

These are in national Park at Arches or just outside the park along the Colorado River.

Arches in Arches (National Park)

Arches National Park is named (naturally) for the large number of arches found within its boundaries. To get a sense of its layout, look at the park map at:
http://www.arches.national-park.com/map.htm
These are a small sample of the arches found there , in order:
1. Unnamed arch on the trail to Delicate Arch.
2. Delicate Arch - iconic symbol of the park.
3. The formation containing Delicate Arch from a couple of miles off and higher up. Note Delicate Arch is to the left of a cluster of approximately one half dozen "mounds", and one third in from the left of the image.
4. Landscape Arch - along a trail starting at the North end of the road inside the park.
5. A small unnamed arch along the trail at the North end of the road.
6. Partition Arch - also along the above -mentioned trail.
7. Navajo Arch - again along the north trail - but on a loop back to the Southwest.
8. Skyline Arch - along the road South of the campgrounds.
9. Triple Arch - For those of you who watched the movie "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade", you may remember this as one of the locations in the early part of the film. In fact, most of the early part of the film was shot on location in various parts of the park.

Fins/Buttes/Mesas Along the Colorado

Along the Colorado River northeast of Moab are a number of these fins or buttes or mesas (depends on which local you listen to). They are formed by the erosion of the cap rock over the collapsed salt dome that shaped the local geology.

The Writing Is On The Wall

The dark desert varnish provides a strong contrast to the underlying red rock. Native Americans used this contrast to make petroglyphs or rock art. Simply scraping through the desert varnish, native Americans left panels providing records of events, hunting information, instructions on how to follow them, etc.

These panels are part of the heritage of the Native American peoples and are protected by law. However, as can be seen in the second image, modern graffiti occasionally intrudes on the panels.

The first five are on the rock walls on Highway 279 just outside Moab (i.e. on the north bank of the Colorado River). Some are close to the level of the river bank. Others, as in the third and fourth images, are fairly high up the cliff wall and would have required some effort in reaching the panel during its creation.

Smaller, more crudely made pictures can also be found as seen in the fifth image.

The appearance of the panels along Highway 279 (the first five images) differs somewhat from the panel found in Arches National Park along the trail to Delicate Arch (sixth and seventh images). A park sign along that trail attributes this panel to members of the Ute nation. Note this panel was made after 1600 CE because hunters are shown riding horses. Horses were not introduced into the area until after 1600.

Red Cliffs Along the Colorado River

As you proceed toward Moab along Highway 128, you reach the Colorado River, a name derived from the red colour of the water's load of iron mineral based silt.

Along each side of the river all the way to Moab, and beyond along Highway 279, you follow he river's edge and are contained by steep red cliff walls rising several hundred meters. The river has cut itself deeply into the surrounding rock formations.

Large sections of the older cliff walls are covered in a dark deposit. This thin blueish black material is a thin layer of manganese rich clay acted on by bacteria and is called “desert varnish”. It only covers areas which have been stable for a long time and have not had significant water erosion. The dark coating is a stark contrast to the underlying red rock, a characteristic used by Native Americans.

In some areas, the cliffs have been more eroded and form slightly dome shaped formations, whose vertical faces have been further eroded by wind, rain, and freeze-thaw cycles. In such cases, the hollowing out is a precursor to arch formation and can be seen in these images. The ones shown here are along Highway 279.

Fisher Towers, Utah

Along Highway 128, about 20 miles northeast of intended destination, Moab, we found ourselves back into a storm system. As we rounded a bend in the road we came upon some dramatic views of Fisher Towers along the Colorado River.

This rock formation, like the entire area, is a deep red with shades of deep purple and occasionally greens due to various mineral in the rock with iron being responsible for the reds.

These formations are a favourite among local rock climbers.