Checkerboard Mesa
by Rob Hemphill
Title
Checkerboard Mesa
Artist
Rob Hemphill
Medium
Photograph - Photography
Description
On leaving the East Entrance of Zion National Park driving towards Bryce Canyon National Park is the Checkerboard Mesa. This is a sandstone hill with unusual crack patterns in the rock which resemble a grid similar to those on a checkerboard.
This majestic criss-crossed mountain appears as a massive hill towering 900 feet above the Zion to Mt. Carmel Highway. The vertical and horizontal fissures are more evident on the north side of the mesa, where most of the photographs of the mountain are taken. The left to right deep scratches are due to a north to south wind direction while the vertical cracks are a result of weathering, a cycle of freezing and thawing.
Change always continues in the park, so much so that in time the massive monoliths will eventually break down and once again become great dunes of sand. Immediately west of Checkerboard Mesa is Crazy Quilt Mesa, another great example of cross-bedding.
Checkerboard Mesa was once known as Rock Candy Mountain, but in 1938 the superintendent of Zion in his book, "Favorite Hikes in and around Zion National Park" gave it the name we use today.
Hikers can take a trail up the side of Checkerboard Mesa to the northern tip where they can look down upon the magnificent smooth stone hills, desert tanks and odd shaped outcroppings of twisted and manipulated sandstone seen in various shapes and sizes on the eastern side of Zion.
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Featured in the following FAA Groups:
"ABC Group" 04/16/2020
"National Parks" 02/04/2020
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Uploaded
January 26th, 2020
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Viewed 465 Times - Last Visitor from New York, NY on 04/19/2024 at 4:10 PM
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