Walking Through History

The Waterpocket Fold is a powerful example of the forces of plate tectonics at work.  It is difficult to take in how the earth could have pushed against itself with such power that a piece of it was originally lifted 7,000 feet out of the ground for 100 miles – exposing the geological history of the region in the longest monocline in North America.  Layer upon layer of 65 million years of deposited time reveal how this area once supported ocean life, swamps, and river bottom – all hard to believe as we stood in the dry, sandy bottoms now present.  The park currently averages only about 7 inches of rainfall per year…and with strong gusts of wind, we were sandblasted such that I felt as if I had just received a full-body exfoliating scrub.

The park exposes not only geological history, but human history as well.  From the petroglyphs found on the sides of the red rock walls to the names of early Mormon travelers signed on the walls in the wash (that until 1962 was the only road through the area) known as the “Pioneer Register”, there are signs of those who came before us.  The area known as Fruita is filled with orchards that were established by the early settlers to the area and are still active today.

We tried to sample both the geological and human history in our limited time by climbing to the top of the fold at Hickman Bridge and by walking and driving through the wash areas below the fold to see what it might have been like to travel through these parallel ridges that the early travelers called “reefs” (because they appeared to be the equivalent of impassable coral reefs of the sea).  The wash areas hold many other historical stories as well – Butch Cassidy was thought to have spent time hiding out in the Grand Wash at one point.  But the stories date back much further than our limited view of history and, once again remind us that although our time here is brief, our impact on the land remains.