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Picture: Part of the San Rafael Swell
The drive through Utah was very interesting, with a diverse range of scenery on offer; from snow covered mountains to flat dusty plains, including among others, the San Rafael Swell and Zion National Park.
It often felt like driving through a "Road Runner" cartoon, with boulders sitting precariously on the edge of ridges. I could imagine the 'Coyote' hiding behind the boulders waiting for a 'Beep...Beep'.
Highway 70 dissects the swell just before the town of Green River. This must have been a massive project to excavate a huge section of solid rock to allow the road to pass through.
Zion National Park
The first evidence of human use in this region dates to about 7,000 years ago when small family groups camped wherever they could collect plants, seeds, and hunt. About 2000 years ago, some groups began growing corn and other crops. They built permanent villages (often called ''pueblos''). Between A. D. 900-1200, two distinctive puebloan farming cultures were here: the Virgin Branch Anasazi and the Parowan Fremont. The Southern Paiute were also in the region by A. D. 1100. While the Puebloan cultures migrated to other areas of the southwest by A.D. 1200, the Southern Paiute remained to the present day. In the mid-19th century, Euro-Americans began establishing settlements in Zion Canyon.
In 1919, a Congressional bill designating Zion National Park was signed into law. Visitation to the new national park increased steadily during the 1920s, particularly after the Union Pacific extended a spur rail line to Cedar City. The Utah Parks Company, a subsidiary of the Union Pacific, acquired the Wylie Camp in Zion, and offered ten day rail/bus tours to Zion, Bryce, Kaibab, and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Construction on the Zion Lodge complex, designed in “Rustic Style” by architect Gilbert Stanley Underwood, began in the mid-1920s. In 1930, the newly completed Zion-Mt Carmel highway allowed motorists to travel through Zion to Bryce and points east. This highway was one of the greatest engineering feats of modern times, requiring the construction of a 5,613-foot tunnel to negotiate the vertical sandstone cliffs of Zion.
For a complete history of Zion National Park please visit Zion Canyon.com.
Picture: Zion National Park
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Click here to view the Zion National Park Picture Gallery
This page was last updated on 20-Apr-2008.