Today we spent exploring the rim of Bryce Canyon. The limestone mountains have been sculpted into extraordinary shapes by thousands of years of erosion. Blasting winds, rain and snow have all played their part. In winter the ice forms in cracks and crevices, the ice expands the cracks and then thaws in spring, a process that further erodes the limestone.
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| A limestone formation like this is called a 'hoodoo' |
Limestone is naturally white, but minerals washed into the rock colours it, so the cliffs are pink, red, cream, even blue and purple. In parts of the rim we were around 2,7500 metres (9000 feet) high, and it was difficult to breathe the thinner air at that height.
One point is called Powell Point, and is the last place on the north American continent to be explored and mapped, an extremely difficult task because of the steepness and slipperiness of the ground.
Near there, there have been discoveries of many dinosaur fossils. There is evidence that Tyrannosaurus Rex and Velociraptors roamed the area. Later we drove to another state park called Kodachrome Basin,where the vivid red rocks form different shapes called candles. We saw some ruins of a sandstone granary or food storage place made by ancient Pueblo Indians.
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