OCR Text |
Show Bryce Canyon National Fsrli The Great Organ In Bryce Canyon , ? This Is one of a aerie? of articles to appear In this newspaper, sponsored by the Salt Lake Advertising Club, associated civic clubs of southern and central Utah, and chsjmbera of commerce; part of a program to point out Utah's resources so that local people will "Know Utah Better". By MARION C. NELSON On all the awesome sights on the face of the earth, there is none more breath-taking none that more completely overwhelms an observer, than Bryce Canyon. This scenic wonder is approximately twenty-five miles from Panguitch and is reached over splendid highways. It has been said that if a view of this great amphitheatre does not create a feeling akin to reverence, nothing ever will. - While Bryce Canyon is not as extensive, it Is like Cedar Breaks, intensified. Crowded into 35,240 acres, 8,000 feet elevation at the rim, Bryce Canyon presents such a spectacle that in recognition of its unusual scenic value it was made a National Monument in 1923 and changed to a National Park in 1928. From Cedar Breaks to Bryce Canyon one passes through seventy miles of most interesting and varied scenery as though to prepare the visitor for the climax at the rim of Bryce. Crossing the broad summit sum-mit of the Markagunt Plateau the highway traverses fine coniferous forests that frequently open into charming "parks", and passes great areas covered with lava from Hancock Peak and the adjacent extinct volcanoes. Navajo Lake, a beautiful mountain tarn encircled by pines, and a noted fishing water, is about eight miles beyond Midway. Soon pretty Duck Creek, rising in full power from a fine spring and filled with trout, parallels the highway for several miles, then disappears disap-pears under the volcanic rock. At the crossing of Strawberry Gulch a little used trail extends southward to Strawberry Point, a famous observation ob-servation point on the Pink Cliffs. The main highway is alternately surfaced with white, pink, and red rock, a painted road in a land ol color. The road enters Red Canyon which is so like Bryce, on a smaller scale, that you may be excused for thinking you have already arrived. A few miles more of travel through a pine dotted valley, walled with red rock, and you come to Bryce Canyon National Park. At first you may be disappointed 1 Here is Bryce Lodge, but there seems to be nothing to indicate the existence of a canyon. Have patience, for you notice a footpath leading directly away from the lodge. A short walk and there bursts upon you one of the most brilliant sights ever beheld by man! The thing about Bryce Canyon that will fascinate you, that will keep you entranced for hours on end, is the weird sculpture of the rock formations that rise in countless numbers from the canyon depths, and the brilliant colors with which they are tinted. As you stand for the first time on the rim of this fairyland of reality, real-ity, looking downward, your first thought is that some giant hand scooped out a bowl in this Utah plateau, and then studded it with these strange beautifully-colored figures that rise from the canyon floor. They scarcely seem real. Perhaps the Indians who once roamed through this country described de-scribed it as well as it can be done. Their name for Bryce was "bowl-shaped-canyon-filled-with-red-rocks-standing-up-like-men". But though these figures rise erect from the canyon floor, like men, they resemble almost anything under the sun that your imagination can conceive. Here in one place is a whole city of spires, their bases tinted with a deep rose, their tips glittering in brilliant frost-white. Single forms are everywhere. Here is a statue of Queen Victoria; there another of the Pope the resemblances so amazing that you can hardly believe your eyes. A few of the established names in Bryce may give you an idea of the variety of the forms: the Organ, the Sculptor's Studio, the Queen's Castle, Tower Bridge, Moon Temple, Bluebeard's Castle. But the changing colors of Bryce are almost more amazing than its figures. Lighted by the morning sun, the canyon looks like a bowl of glowing embers, decorated with lace and filigree work. It is no wonder that the Indians referred to Bryce as the "canyon of fire". At midday the canyon has lost its sparkle and seems to sleep in the sunlight. sun-light. At sunset the colors are brought out in soft hues, and by moonlight, moon-light, the deep shadows set off the brilliant white spires, making them almost seem to glow with a white light. No visit to Bryce is complete until you have seen it from the trails that wind through the depths of the canyon. Like the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, the view from the rim serves only to stimulate the. imagination, and a descent to the canyon floor is the only means by which a traveler may fully appreciate the versatility of nature's art displayed there. Here too, as at Grand Canyon, no observer can look at the great amphitheatre spread out below him, sigh, and say to himself him-self "well, now I've seen Bryce Canyon", for the moving sun constantly constant-ly sets a new stage with new scenery so different that you may spend days at the canyon always being surprised with new quirks of color and form. |