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Show r ' P r ' ' " , L - I - - ; r K , ' lilpsi Wi ir 1 IfWv- - ' -v ,'s' v-- -iv:tf - GOBLIN VALLEY IS FUTURE UTAH PARK "There's no place on earth quite like hi" That's the way ' visitors describe Coblin Valley in south-central Emery Em-ery County,' one of Utah's most unusual and little-known scenic attractions. at-tractions. Its name is apropos, because when one walks among its eerie, fantastic, formations, goblins, giant birds, reptiles and all manner of strange creatures seem to jump out from all sides. Coblin Valley is located at the southeast corner of the San Rafael Swell, a short drive away from State Highway 24 between Creen River and Hanksville. To get there, visitors must drive over some 10 miles of dirt road, portions of which are impassible to the ordinary vehicle ve-hicle at certain times of the year, especially after a heavy rain.. Visitors should also be cautioned caution-ed that there are no camping facilities fa-cilities at Coblin Valley. One should also carry water with him as there are no developed wells or springs in the area. Coblin Valley is being featured in this week's "See Utah" series because it is a proposed state park and needs to be called to the public attention, according to D. James Cannon, director of the Utah Tour-ist Tour-ist and Publicity Council. A visitor to Goblin Valley in south-central Emery County looks up in awe at one of the "gob-' "gob-' lins" of this fantastic scenic wonder. The giant, bird-like figure is just one of literally thousands of strange nature-made statues in the area. ' "At the present time Goblin Valley lies in the public domain and is unprotected from vandalism," vandal-ism," Mr. Cannon aaid. We are hopeful that the State Park and Recreation Commission can acquire enough land in the near future to make it a part of the Utah Park system." About 600 acres of land, a small portion of' the scenic area, is held on lease by the state park agency from the U.S. Bureau of Land Management Man-agement which administers the mining and grazing rights on the surrounding domain. The discovery xf Coblin Valley is attributed to Arthur L. Chaffin of Teasdale, Wayne County, Utah. Chaffin, now a retired river runner and former operator of the Colorado Colo-rado River Ferry at Hite, stumbled onto the site about 35 years ago while looking for a road route between be-tween Green River and Hanksville. Mr. Chaffin was intrigued by Goblin Valley's unusual formations and called the area "Mushroom Valley" because many of the figures fig-ures were bulbous on top and did indeed look like mushrooms. The name was later changed to Goblin Valley because the witches, spooks and goblins won out. Goblin Valley did not come into public prominence until 1949. In that year, Mr. Chaffin took some friends, including photographer and businessman Philip W. Tomkins of San Francisco, Calif.,' into Cathedral Cathe-dral Valley and Goblin Valley. Mr. Tompkins took the first known photographs of the "goblins" and these pictures' were later widely circulated. Actually, Goblin Valley is a cliff rimmed basin, filled with thousands of unusual, goblin-like formations. The number of creatures crea-tures one sees is limited only by the imagination. These formations have been sculptured by wind, rain, frost and sun over millions of years. To the geologist, the formations were eroded out of reddish-brown or chocolate colored Entrada sandstone sand-stone of the upper Jurassic series. This erosion is constantly going on today. |