The Adventures of Flat Stanley: Bryce Canyon National Park

“You remind me of a man.”

“What man?”

“A man with a power.”

“What power?”

“The power of Hoodoo.”

“Hoodoo?”

“You do!”

“I do what?”

“You remind me of a man.”

Hoodoos are pillars of rock, usually of a fantastic shape, left by erosion. That’s what you see behind Flat Stanley. They are some of the famous hoodoos found in Bryce Canyon National Park, where the landscape is bordering on the surreal. Coincidentally, Hoodoo also means to cast a spell in a folk magic offshoot of Voodoo which involves the use Biblical texts and characters. This land certainly does possess a type of magic that draws you into it, and fills you with awe.

Bryce Canyon is very close to the Paunsaugunt fault line, where the Colorado Plateau was pushed thousands of feet in elevation in some ancient plate tectonic activity. Bryce Canyon is on the low side of the fault line, but that does not mean that it didn’t feel the effects of the Colorado Plateau slipping by. The land experienced stress fractures in the base rock. The base rock is particularly porous, allowing water to seep into the cracks, and into the heart of the rock. Of course winter’s freezes act on this water to change it to ice, which splits off the base rock. Repeat the process thousands of times, add lots of wind and rainwater based erosion, and you’ve got the splendor that is Bryce Canyon National Park.

Very often the power of erosion on a large scale is difficult to observe in a lifetime. Looking at these fragile formations, you may get the impression that they have been here forever, and will remain in the shelter of the canyon wall. But on May 23, 2006, a huge rock fall of about 400-500 tons crashed to the ground and closed off the very popular Navajo Loop trail at a location called Wall Street. Wall Street is a point on the trail where a shear rock wall, about fifty feet tall is split by a distance of about eight feet. Fortunately, park trail crews acted with haste to reopen the trail, removing many boulders as large as cars to do so.

Flat Stanley thoroughly enjoyed the newly-reopened Navajo Loop trail. Just as the hoodoo pillars are a spectacle to see collectively in the distance, it is equally impressive to walk amongst them. The walks on Navajo Loop and Queens Garden trails left Flat Stanley yearning for more.

Arches in the Making