This has been a gray snowy week. The pass has over 5 feet of snow now sitting on the ground and the avalanche danger is high. So...I am posting an image from my most recent trip into the Canyonlands. I have had a number of friends over the years leave the mountains to become full time desert rats. I am moving that way myself. My youth was spent climbing all over Colorado, a little higher than John Denver campsite. The alpine tundra was the place to be. My graduate work was studying the glacial history of The Colorado Rockies.
Now, I crave the desert. I am enjoying my transition from mountaineer to desert rat.
The image above is looking east from deep in the canyons. The rock is the Cedar Mesa Sandstone...Permian in age. The red layers come from sediment sloughing off the Uncompaghre Uplift in Western Colorado, the white layers come from Sahara like sand dunes to the north. The mountains in the distance are the La Sal Mountains, a laccolith just outside of Moab and in the foreground is one of the six shooter peaks, a column of Wingate sandstone...my favorite formation in the canyons.
It's dumping up on the pass. I really need to go skiing
Hope everyone has a great Christmas.
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