Читать книгу Backpacking Arizona. From Deep Canyons to Sky Islands онлайн

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Laccolithic Mountains

As you look east through Rainbow Bridge, Navajo Mountain is framed majestically under its span. The 10,346-foot, dome-shaped mountain is one of the sacred mountains that the Navajo believe form the four pillars supporting the sky. It formed when volcanic magma pushed upward into the horizontal sedimentary rocks to create the plateau. The liquid rock lifted the rocks above into a huge blister, but failed to reach the surface to create a volcano. As the dome of rock eroded, the solidified magma at its core was revealed. Today the rounded summit of Navajo Mountain consists of the exposed, intruded core, while the flanks of the mountain are draped with upturned layers of Navajo sandstone. These tilted have eroded into towering fins and buttresses, visible from the trail just before the descent into Cliff Canyon.

Exploration of Rainbow Bridge

Navajo Bridge was first publicized by the Cummings–Douglass party in 1909 after a long, difficult journey from Oljeto Trading Post, 50 miles to the east. The group brought back such glowing reports of the sandstone bridge that President Taft used the Antiquities Act to create Rainbow Bridge National Monument the following year. A few tourists reached the remote bridge during the next few decades, but to do so they had to make an arduous pack trip of many days from Oljeto. Later, the trail was built, shortening the journey considerably. In the 1950s Rainbow Bridge became a popular side hike for river runners traversing the depths of Glen Canyon on the Colorado River. It was still a 7-mile hike from the Colorado River, up Forbidding and Rainbow Bridge Canyons. Mass tourism at Rainbow Bridge began with the filling of Lake Powell in the 1960s, which marked the end of the bridge’s isolation. Now Rainbow Bridge is a major destination for private boaters, tour boats, and aircraft.