Images of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument – Southern Utah, taken in May 2018.

As with most BLM (Bureau of Land Management) parks, Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument has no paved roads, however, there are several roads that are accessible to high clearance vehicles so I set out to discover what I could and found out that there was plenty to see.

First I ventured into the heart of the park along Cottonwood Road, my goal was to see Grosvenor Arch which was approximately 30 miles from civilization or in this case US 89. The road was in great shape with only a few rough or wet spots, nothing to even worry about, and the double arch was beautiful as advertised. What were equally impressive were all the other incredible sites I stumbled upon along the way; a small canyon of colorful formations, a ridge of large patches of land lifted as if pealed up from a normally flat position, and strange and colorful rock formations around every bend in the road. Then along the southern boundary of the park were the hoodoos along the Toadstools Trail and the colorful hillsides of the Paria valley.

I saw only a slice of the 1.9 million acres of this park but every inch was spectacular and worth saving. Unfortunately this is one of the parks that was downsized by presidential proclamation in 2017 for coal mining and oil and gas leasing interests, and the new boundaries would exclude the Toadstools and Paria valley from park protection. However, the action is being challenged through the court system on the basis that the Antiquities Act cannot be used to undo the designation of monuments by past presidents; here’s to hoping that this effort is ultimately successful.