HISTORY109 - America's Canyonlands

Pat and I are signed up for a trip in Fall 2025 - a Tauck tour called “America’s Canyonlands.”  Our route of travel (from the Tauck brochure) shown below, starting in Phoenix/Scottsdale, and ending in Las Vegas.   The canyonland sites that we will visit are also shown.

Travel route for Tauck’s America’s Canyonlands tour.

 

Note:  Pat and I have visited virtually all of these sites before, mostly on our own, some several times.  At this stage of our senior-citizen traveling, we wanted to visit these favorite sites on a tour so we could focus on appreciating the sites and not worry about the logistics of the trip. 

I will be discussing the history of each canyonlands site, in order, following along our travel path, and adding personal notes (in italics) to share our previous experiences at each site and our anticipated activities on this trip.

For reference, I have provided below a roadmap for our adventure, locating the sites that we will visit.

Roadmap of the America’s Canyonlands tour.

 I will list my principal sources at the end.

 

Introduction to “Canyonlands” History

The America’s Canyonlands tour traverses the Colorado Plateau, formed between 70 and 30 million years ago, through the action of plate tectonics (movements of pieces of the Earth’s crust) that lifted the entire region.   Centered on the Four Corners region of the southwestern U.S., the Colorado Plateau ranges from 5,000 to 8,000 feet in elevation.  This semi-arid region has produced many distinctive erosional features such as arches, domes, arroyos, deep canyons, cliffs, natural bridges, pinnacles, hoodoos, monoliths, and slot canyons. 

Our America’s Canyonlands trip traverses the Colorado Plateau.

 

The Ancestral Pueblo People lived on the Colorado Plateau from roughly 2,000 to 700 years ago, to be succeeded by various Native American tribes.  The first visits to the area by Europeans is credited to Spanish Conquistador Francisco Coronado’s expedition of 1540 and subsequent transit by two Spanish priests, Francisco Domínguez and Silvestre Vélez de Escalante, in 1776.  In the early 1800s, American trappers began to exploit the Colorado Plateau’s rivers, followed by sundry expeditions sent by the U.S. government to explore and map the region.  Settlers arrived soon thereafter.

Now I’ll talk about the special places we’re going to visit.

 

Sedona

Sedona's main attraction is its array of striking red sandstone formations that appear to glow in brilliant orange and red when illuminated by the rising or setting sun.  The red rocks form a popular backdrop for many activities, ranging from driving on scenic roadways, hiking and biking on hundreds of trails, to visiting centers of energy called vortexes that are said to enhance meditation, self-discovery, and spiritual growth. 

The red rocks of Sedona were formed out of a unique layer of rock known as the Schnebly Hill Formation, a thick layer of red to orange-colored sandstone found only in the Sedona vicinity. The sandstone was deposited over 250 million years ago; the spectacular rock formations resulted from tectonic plate action, sea changes, and erosion forces.  The red color comes from iron that was trapped in ancient seawaters. 

Sedona sits at an elevation of 4,350 feet, with its highest formations reaching about 7,000 feet elevation.

 The colorful red rocks of Sedona at sunset.

 

We have visited Sedona many times, enjoying the red rocks on Pink Jeep tours, driving the scenic roads ourselves, and hiking.  We even have special locations to photograph particular formations; some of these photographs hang on the walls of our home and appear on our computer screen-savers.  Sedona is one of our favorite places to look at, and sometimes buy, western and Native American art.  Sedona is also a great “base” for day trips to the famous mining town of Jerome and nearby wine country.  On the downside, we have experienced the tremendous growth of traffic and visitors to this wonderful region.

One of our special-location phots of Cathedral Rocks, taken though the branches of a tree.

 

Sedona has been occupied by humans for thousands of years.  Over a 1,000 years ago, primitive hunter gatherers evolved into the Native Americans we know as Sinagua, who farmed in the Sedona region and traded with faraway tribes.

The first Anglo settler in the Sedona area was John James Thompson in 1876.  Three years later, the family of Abraham James arrived.  A few more settlers came to the area in 1880. 

In 1899, a young man from Gorin, Missouri, T. C. Schnebly, and his wife Sedona moved to Sedona.  The Schnebly’s built a large two-story home that also served as the area's first hotel and general store.  T. C. saw a need for regular mail service, and organized the little village’s first post office.  By the turn of the century, about 15 homesteading families called this area home

Sedona’s first prominent citizens, Sedona and T. C. Schnebly.

 

The village of Sedona was named after Sedona Schnebly, who was celebrated for her hospitality and industriousness.  Her mother, Amanda Miller, claimed to have made the name up because "it sounded pretty.”

The early settlers were farmers and ranchers.  Most agriculture in early Sedona was for home consumption, or for a limited seasonal market in Flagstaff and the mining boom town of Jerome.  Using water from Oak Creek, both the Native Americans and the first Anglo settlers irrigated small patches of ground to raise food for their families.  Cattle provided beef as well as milk and butter.  But it was fruit growing - particularly apples and peaches - which played the most significant part in the early Sedona economy.

In 1902, Sedona residents helped build a road up out of the canyon to provide better access to fruit markets in Flagstaff and Phoenix.  Following an old cow path, the narrow, steep, and windy road was first called Munds Road, but today is known as Schnebly Hill Road. This unpaved primitive road is still open and offers wonderful views of Sedona, but is a very rough road.   (SR 89A, winding through scenic Oak Creek Canyon from Sedona to Flagstaff, was first completed in 1914, and paved for the first time in 1938.)

Map of Sedona area, showing Schnebly Hill Road and SR 89A through Oak Creek Canyon.

 

Pat and I have driven our family car up and down Schnebly Hill Road several times over the years - in our younger, more adventurous days.  The last time, we barely made it due to the rocky hairpin turns.

Sedona grew slowly.  In 1902, when the Sedona post office was established, there were 55 residents.  In the mid-1950s, the first telephone directory listed 155 names.  Some parts of the Sedona area were not electrified until the 1960s.  The city did not incorporate until 1988.

As the scenic wonders and sites of Sedona became known, Sedona became a popular place for shooting movies.  Almost 100 feature films and countless video productions and commercials have been shot in the Sedona area. 

Sedona began to develop as a tourist destination, vacation-home, and retirement center in the 1950s.  Local ranchers sold property to developers.  The orchards were transformed into homes designed for retirees, while shopping centers and resorts were built for the many tourists flocking to the area.  Tourism quickly surpassed agriculture in economic importance.

In 1956, construction of the Chapel of the Holy Cross was completed. The chapel rises 70 feet out of a 1,000-foot redrock cliff.  Most of the development seen today was constructed in the 1980s and 1990s.  As of 2007, there were no large tracts of undeveloped land remaining.

Sedona’s Chapel of the Holy Cross.

 

Today, Sedona has a total area of 19.2 square miles and a population of just under 10,000 people.  Over three million people visit Sedona annually.

On the Tauck tour, we look forward to relaxing on our luxury bus, viewing the spectacular formations, and revisiting the town of Sedona.

 

Oak Creek Canyon

Oak Creek Canyon is a gorge carved into the edge of the Mogollon Rim of the Colorado Plateau along the Oak Creek Fault (where the Earth's crust completely breaks and slides past each other).  Tectonic forces shifting the land to either side of the fault and subsequent erosion by Oak Creek have created a spectacular canyon, located between the cities of Sedona and Flagstaff. 

Oak Creek Canyon is about 12 miles long, ranging in width from 0.8 to 2.5 miles. The depth of the canyon ranges from 800 to 2,000 feet.  Due to the faulting that played a major role in its formation, the west rim of the canyon is 700 feet higher than the east rim.  The average elevation of the west rim is 7,200 feet while the east rim elevation is 6,500 feet.

Oak Creek Canyon from Oak Creek Vista Point along SR 89A.

 

Oak Creek (one of the few perennial streams in the high desert region of northern Arizona) flows year-round along the bottom of the Canyon, providing water for plants and wildlife, as well as fishing and swimming opportunities.  Oak Creek continues through Sedona, joining the Verde River southeast of Cottonwood.

For many years, we had a timeshare in Flagstaff, and enjoyed the scenic drive through Oak Creek Canyon to Sedona and back many times.  We always stop at the Garlands Jewelry store to shop to for Native American art.  One of our all-time favorite restaurants, L’Auberge de Sedona, serves great food at tables right along Oak Creek, in the lower canyon, in Sedona.  

Approximately 65 million years ago, during a period of great mountain building, movement along Oak Creek Fault caused the east side of what is now Oak Creek Canyon to shift upwards approximately 600 feet. The exposed top rock layers eroded away until the eastern and western sides of the fault were level once again.

A few more millions of years passed, and a canyon had formed.  Streams carrying gravel, then lava, flowed into the canyon from the north.  In the past six million years, the fault became active again and the modern Oak Creek Canyon was carved along it. This time, the fault caused the eastern rim of the Canyon to drop around 700 feet lower than the western rim.

The spectacularly eroded walls of the canyon are formed mostly of sedimentary rocks. The more predominant rocks exposed in the cliffs are buff to white colored, frequently Coconino Sandstone, and the red sandstones of the Schnebly Hill Formation.  The youngest rocks exposed in the canyon are a series of basalt lava flows that form the east rim, the youngest of which is an estimated 6 million years old.

See the Sedona section above for a discussion of human habitation of the area, and history of development.

Today, Oak Creek Canyon is located within the Coconino National Forest.   Portions of the canyon have been designated federal wilderness areas.  The United States Forest Service operates several campgrounds, picnic areas, and recreation areas within the canyon.  Slide Rock State Park, home to a natural water slide along Oak Creek, is also located within Oak Creek Canyon.  Other recreational activities include swimming and fishing in Oak Creek.  There are 49 fishable miles along the creek.  Hiking the many trails leading into side canyons, or up to the rim of the canyon, is a popular activity.

One of the best places to get the big picture view of the Oak Creek Canyon’s fascinating geologic history is Oak Creek Vista. The Vista provides a view from the top of the Canyon, where the eastern drop is easily seen.

Every time that Pat and I visit the area, we stop at this awesome viewpoint.

The number of annual visitors to Oak Creek Canyon is estimated to be between 1.5 million and 4 million people. 

On the Tauck tour, we will certainly enjoy our passage through Oak Creek Canyon, on the way to Flagstaff.  Maybe we can get the bus to stop at Garlands.

 

Grand Canyon

The Grand Canyon lies in the southwestern portion of the Colorado Plateau, and consists essentially of horizontal layered rocks and lava flows.  The broad, intricately sculptured chasm of the canyon contains between its outer walls a multitude of imposing peaks, buttes, gorges, and ravines.  It ranges in width from about 175 yards to 18 miles, and extends in a winding course from the mouth of the Paria River, near Lees Ferry and the northern boundary of Arizona with Utah, to Grand Wash Cliffs, near the Nevada state line, about 277 miles.  The Grand Canyon also includes many tributary side canyons and surrounding plateaus.

Well after the uplifting formation of the Colorado Plateau tens of millions of years ago, only about 5-6 million years ago, the Colorado River began to carve its way downward through the horizontal layers of rock and sediments, exposing hundreds of millions of years of the Earth’s environmental history. 

Continued erosion by rockslides and tributary streams has led to the widening of the canyon and the formation of temples and buttes that we see today.  These forces of nature are still at work slowly deepening and widening the Grand Canyon.

Today, the Colorado River, at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, lies more than 6,000 feet below its rim.  The North Rim, at approximately 8,200 feet above sea level, is some 1,200 feet higher than the South Rim. In its general color, the Grand Canyon is red, but each stratum, or group of strata, has a distinctive hue - buff and gray, delicate green and pink, or, in its depths, brown, slate-gray, and violet.

The Colorado River, over millions of years, forged this spectacular Grand Canyon.

 

With Flagstaff as a base camp for day-trips, we have visited the South Rim of the Grand Canyon many times - mostly in summer, but once in winter, traveling by train from Winslow to stay at the famous El Tovar Hotel and have dinner in their dining room with views of the canyon.   We usually combined trips to the South Rim with stops at the Museum of Northern Arizona and/or Cameron Trading Post to view high-end Native American art. In addition to scenic photos of the spectacular vistas that decorate our home, we collected material documenting the photographic and architectural (Mary Jane Coulter) history of the South Rim buildings.  Years ago, we could drive ourselves all along the South Rim from overlooks west of Grand Canyon Village to Desert View at the eastern boundary of the National Park.  Unfortunately, these days, as the number of visitors has increased, shuttles have replaced personal driving for view sites in the west and center of the South Rim - the crowds can be annoying.  Our solution lately, has been to buy a picnic lunch, and visit the eastern part of the South Rim only, stopping along the way at favorite vistas to eat our lunch.

Here's Pat on our winter-time stay at the South Rim.  She got me up to photograph sunrise when the temperature was below zero.

 

The Grand Canyon was first discovered by non-indigenous people in 1540, when a group of 13 Spanish soldiers visited the South Rim, led by García López de Cárdenas, dispatched from the expedition of Francisco Vázquez de Coronado, traveling northward from Mexico City in search of the Seven Cities of Cíbola.

Lieutenant Joseph C. Ives of the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers led the first survey expedition to the Grand Canyon area in 1857 and 1858.

More than a decade later, with help from the Smithsonian Institution, geologist John Wesley Powell led the first expedition to explore the region and document its scientific offerings.  On May 24, 1869, the group of nine men set out from Green River Station in Wyoming, down the Colorado River, and through the Grand Canyon.

The Powell expedition, and a second expedition two years later, systematically cataloged rock formations, plants, animals, and archaeological sites.  Photographs and illustrations from the Powell expeditions greatly popularized the canyonland region of the southwest United States, especially the Grand Canyon.  President Benjamin Harrison first protected the Grand Canyon in 1893 as a forest reserve.

The John Wesley Powell expeditions brought the Grand Canyon to the attention of the public.

 

An east-west rail line to the largest city in the area, Flagstaff, was completed in 1882 by the Santa Fe Railroad.  Stage coaches started to bring tourists from Flagstaff to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon the next year for $10.  In 1901, a spur of the Santa Fe Railroad, from Williams to Grand Canyon Village on the South Rim, was completed.  The first state highway to reach the South Rim from Williams, SR 64, was completed in 1933.  The 50-mile segment of U.S. 180 that connects Flagstaff to SR 64 at Valle was completed in 1960.

Development of accommodations for tourists started on the South Rim in the 1880s.  The arrival of the railroad in 1901, and automobiles a few years later, greatly increased tourism and development on the South Rim.

The spectacular Grand Canyon, offering incomparable vistas, was designated as a national monument in 1908, and a national park in 1919.  In 2023, 4,733,705 people visited Grand Canyon National Park. 

On the Tauck tour, we’ll leave the driving and parking to our bus driver, enjoy our rim-side accommodations and meals, and renew our appreciation of our favorite natural wonder.

 

Glen Canyon National Recreational Area

Glen Canyon is a natural 170-mile-long canyon carved by the Colorado River, mostly in southeastern and south-central Utah.  A small part of the lower end of Glen Canyon extends into northern Arizona and terminates at Lee's Ferry.

To harness the power of the Colorado River to provide for the water and power needs of millions of people in the West, Glen Canyon Dam, rising 710 feet above bedrock between the steep walls of Glen Canyon, was constructed near the town of Page in 1963-1966.

Glen Canyon Dam, completed in 1966, created Lake Powell.

 

The reservoir, behind the dam, Lake Powell, filled much of Glen Canyon with water hundreds of feet in depth.  Lake Powell’s nearly 2,000 miles of shoreline, and 96 major side canyons, provide for diverse land- and water-based recreational activities. 

Lake Powell.  Note the water-line lighter color of the shoreline, indicating recent lower water levels.

 

Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (GCRA) was established in 1972 "to provide for public use and enjoyment and to preserve the area's scientific, historic, and scenic features."  The GCRA not only includes Lake Powell but also sections of the Colorado and San Juan Rivers, encompassing about 1,960 square miles of some of the most rugged canyon country on the Colorado Plateau - now mostly submerged beneath the waters of Lake Powell.

The underlying landscape of GCRA includes more than 10,000 feet of sedimentary rocks that represent 300 million years of Earth history.  A diverse assemblage of geologic and geographic features is found in GCRA, including mesas, buttes, cliffs, slot canyons, alcoves, hanging gardens, arches, natural bridges, badlands, hoodoos, entrenched meanders, desert varnish, sandstone pipes, and weathering pit

Map of Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.

 

Here are three examples of geologic features found in/near Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.

 

Horseshoe Bend in Glen Canyon, on the Colorado River, downstream from Glen Canyon Dam,

Lees Ferry, where you can rent zodiacs to cruise up the Colorado River to Glen Canyon Dam.

Slot canyon in Antelope Canyon Navajo Tribal Park, just outside the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.

 

Pat has not yet visited Lake Powell.  Bob visited years ago and took a boat trip across the lake to visit the impressive natural arch, Rainbow Bridge.  Together, at various times, we have visited the geologic sites shown above.  We were particularly impressed with the history of Lees Ferry, for a long time, the only crossing of the Colorado River in the region, and the awesome beauty of Antelope Canyon.

GRCA preserves a rich history of human presence, adaptation, and exploration.  The recorded history of Glen Canyon begins with the Dominguez-Escalante expedition in 1776, during which Spanish explorers first documented the existence of Glen Canyon.  The expedition members crossed the Colorado River in Glen Canyon at the site now known as the Crossing of the Fathers.

In the 1830s, trapper Denis Julien may have visited upper Glen Canyon by boat.  In 1869 and again in 1871, the scientific expeditions led by John Wesley Powell traveled through Glen Canyon enroute to the Grand Canyon, resulting in the first formal surveys of the main channel and many of the side canyons.

In the 1890s, hundreds of miners panned for flour gold (fine gold occurring as float) in Glen Canyon.  Between 1898 and 1901, mining engineer Robert Brewster Stanton was employed by mining magnate Julius Stone to design, build, and operate a dredge in an attempt to recover Glen Canyon's flour gold, but the effort failed.

Today, Glen Canyon and Lake Powell are managed by the U.S. Department of the Interior within Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.  The recreation area has been developed for access to Lake Powell via five marinas, four public campgrounds, two small airports, and numerous houseboat rental concessions.  GCRA had 5,206,934 visitors in 2023.

On the Tauck tour next Fall, we are excited about Pat’s seeing Lake Powell for the first time, a planned yacht dinner cruise on Lake Powell, a small plane flight over remote corners of the lake, revisiting Horseshoe Bend and Antelope Canyon, and Colorado River rafting below Glen Canyon Dam.  We expect to decline an optional flight and ground visit to Monument Valley (which we have visited several times in the past), in favor of the slot canyon tour.

 

Bryce Canyon National Park

Bryce Canyon National Park is located in remote southwestern Utah.  The major feature of the park is Bryce Canyon, which is a series of giant natural amphitheaters that extend more than 20 miles north-to-south.  The largest is Bryce Amphitheater, which is 12 miles long, 3 miles wide, and 800 feet deep.

Over thousands of years, stream erosion of the underlying sedimentary rocks resulted in delicate and colorful pinnacles called hoodoos within these amphitheaters that are up to 200 feet high.  Frost weathering also contributed to shaping the formations.  The brown, pink, and red colors are from minerals contained in the rock.

The highest part of the park is in the south at 9,105 feet elevation.  The northeast section is the lowest part of the park at 6,620 feet.

Inspiration Point in Bryce Canyon.

 

Pat and I have visited Bryce Canyon National Park once, many years ago - and loved it.  The colorful, formations are awesome!  We stayed overnight at a motel outside the park, and the next day, entered the park to view the spectacular hoodoos from several vista points - and even hiked among the hoodoos at one site.

Archaeological surveys around Bryce indicate that people have lived in the region for at least 10,000 years.

The Paiute Native Americans moved into the area around 1200 AD.  These Native Americans hunted and gathered for most of their food, while supplementing their diet with cultivated plants. The Paiute developed a mythology surrounding the hoodoos.  They believed that they were the Legend People whom the trickster Coyote turned to stone. 

In the late 18^th and early 19^th century, the first European Americans explored the area.  Mormon scouts visited Bryce in the 1850s to gauge its potential for agriculture, grazing, and settlement.

In 1872, John Wesley Powell, along with a team of mapmakers and geologists, surveyed the Bryce area as part of a larger survey of the Colorado Plateau. 

Small groups of Mormon pioneers followed and settled southeast of Bryce Canyon along the Paria River.  In 1873, the Kanarra Cattle Company started to graze cattle there.

In 1875, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints sent Scottish immigrant Ebenezer Bryce and his wife Mary to settle land that would become Bryce Canyon National Park.  The Bryce family settled right below Bryce Amphitheater.  Bryce grazed his cattle inside what are now park borders.  He built a road to the plateau to retrieve firewood and timber, and a canal to irrigate his crops and water his animals.  Other settlers soon started to call the unusual place "Bryce's Canyon,” and the name stuck.

Ebenezer Bryce and his family lived in this cabin below Bryce Amphitheater (c. 1881).

 

A combination of drought, overgrazing, and flooding eventually drove the remaining Paiutes from the area and prompted the settlers to attempt to build a water diversion channel from local river drainage.  That effort failed, leading most settlers, including the Bryce family, to abandon the area.  The remaining settlers dug a 10-mile ditch from the Sevier River’s east fork into their settlement.

Bryce Canyon’s scenic areas were first described to the public in magazine articles published by the Union Pacific and Santa Fe railroads in 1916.  Forest Supervisor J. W. Humphrey among others promoted the scenic wonders of Bryce Canyon's amphitheaters, and by 1918 more articles helped to spark interest.  However, poor access to the remote area, and the lack of accommodations, kept visitation to a bare minimum.

Ruby Syrett, Harold Bowman, and the Perry brothers established lodging and "touring services.” Syrett later served as the first postmaster.  By the early 1920s, the Union Pacific Railroad became interested in expanding rail service into southwestern Utah to accommodate tourists.

Conservationists became alarmed by the damage overgrazing, logging, and unregulated visitation was inflicting on the canyon.  A movement to protect the area soon started.  In 1923, President Warren G. Harding established Bryce Canyon National Monument.

A road was built the same year on the plateau to provide access to outlooks over the amphitheaters.  From 1924 to 1925, Bryce Canyon Lodge was built from local timber and stone.

In 1928, Bryce Canyon National Park was established.

In 1931, President Herbert Hoover annexed an adjoining area south of the park, and in 1942 an additional 635 acres was added.  This brought the park's total area to the ultimate 56 square miles.  Rim Road, a scenic drive, was completed in 1934 by the Civilian Conservation Corps. 

Today, most park visitors travel the scenic drive, which provides access to 13 viewpoints over the amphitheaters.  In total, 50 miles of trails crisscross the park; Bryce Canyon has eight marked and maintained day hikes.

In 2023, Bryce Canyon received 2,461,269 visitors.

On next fall’s tour, we look forward to getting back to beautiful Bryce Canyon, and this time, staying at Bryce Canyon Lodge, just steps from the forests of hoodoos.

 

Zion National Park

Zion National Park is located in southwestern Utah near the town of Springdale.  Zion includes mountains, canyons, buttes, mesas, monoliths, rivers, slot canyons, and natural arches.  The lowest point in the park is at 3,666 feet elevation and the highest peak is at 8,726 feet.  A prominent feature of the 229-square-mile park is Zion Canyon, which is 15 miles long and up to 2,640 feet deep. The canyon walls are reddish and tan-colored Navajo Sandstone. 

The formations of Zion National Park represent 150 million years of sedimentation.  These geologic formations are part of a super-sequence of rock units called the Grand Staircase.  Over millions of years, Zion Canyon was cut by the North Fork of the Virgin River. During the later part of this process, lava flows and cinder cones covered parts of the area.

Zion Canyon in Zion National Park.

 

We visited Zion National Park once, on the same trip that we visited Bryce.  Compared to Bryce, Zion was sort of a letdown for us.  We were not able to drive or hike on that visit to any unique vista sites, except for one site near the east entrance to the park (see below).  We stayed overnight outside the park in Springdale.

By 1300, Native American Southern Paiute inhabited Zion. 

In the late 18^th century, padres Escalante and Dominguez passed near the northwest section of Zion, becoming the first people of European descent known to visit the area.

In 1825, trapper and trader Jedediah Smith explored some of the local streams while under contract with the American Fur Company.

In 1847, Mormon farmers from the Salt Lake area became the first people of European descent to settle the Virgin River region.

 In 1851, the Cedar City area was settled by Mormons from the Salt Lake who used the nearby Zion area for timber, and for grazing cattle, sheep, and horses.  They prospected for mineral deposits, and diverted water to irrigate crops in the valley below.  Mormon settlers named the area Kolob, which in Mormon scripture is the heavenly place nearest the residence of God.

In 1858, a Southern Paiute guide led young Mormon missionary and interpreter Nephi Johnson into the Zion Canyon.  Johnson wrote a favorable report about the agricultural potential of the Virgin River basin.

The floor of Zion Canyon was settled in 1863 by Isaac Behunin, who farmed corn, tobacco, and fruit trees.  The Behunin family lived in Zion Canyon near the site of today's Zion Lodge during the summer, and wintered in Springdale.  Behunin is credited with naming Zion, a reference to the place of peace mentioned in the Bible.  Two more families settled Zion Canyon in the next couple of years, bringing with them cattle and other domesticated animals.

A ranch near the mouth of Zion Canyon (c. 1910s).

 

John Wesley Powell visited Zion Canyon in 1872, and his photographers took the first photos of the area in 1872-1873.  Paintings of the canyon by Frederick S. Dellenbaugh were exhibited at the Saint Louis World's Fair in 1904, followed by a favorable article in Scribner's Magazine the next year. 

The article and paintings, along with previously created photographs, paintings, and reports, led to President William Howard Taft's proclamation on July 31, 1909, that created Zion National Monument.  The United States Congress added more land and established Zion National Park on November 19, 1919.  A separate Zion National Monument, the Kolob area, was proclaimed on January 22, 1937, and was incorporated into the park on July 11, 1956.

Travel to the area before it was a national park was rare due to its remote location, lack of accommodations, and the absence of real roads in southern Utah.  Old wagon roads were upgraded to the first automobile roads starting about 1910, and the first road into Zion Canyon was built in 1917.

The first visitor lodging in Zion Canyon, called Wylie Camp, was established that same year as a tent camp.  The Utah Parks Company, a subsidiary of the Union Pacific Railroad, acquired Wylie Camp in 1923, and offered ten-day rail/bus tours to Zion, nearby Bryce Canyon, and the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. 

Work on the Zion Mount Carmel Highway (SR 9) started in 1927 to enable reliable access between Springdale and the east side of the park.  The road opened in 1930, and park visit and travel in the area greatly increased.

View of the south end of Zion Canyon from a vista on SR 9 (our photo).

 

Congress designated 85% of the park a wilderness area in 2009.

Today, the Zion Canyon Road is served by a free shuttle bus from early April to late October and by private vehicles the other months of the year.  Additional roads in Zion are open to private vehicles year-round.

Guided horseback riding trips, nature walks, and evening programs are available from late March to early November.  A Junior Ranger Program for children ages 4 and up is active year-round at the Nature Center, Human History Museum, and the visitor centers. 

Seven trails with round-trip times of half an hour to 4 hours are found in Zion Canyon.  A network of trails totaling 50 miles in distance connect Zion's northwest corner of the park to its southeast section.  Zion is also a center for rock climbing.

Lodging in the park is available at Zion Lodge, located halfway through Zion Canyon.  Just outside the park more lodging is available in Springdale.  Zion has three campgrounds.

The park attracted 5 million visitors in 2023.

On our Tauck tour, we hope to use the shuttle system, installed since we were there before, to get deeper into the park and perhaps see more of the canyon.  We also look forward to staying overnight within the canyon at Zion Lodge.

 

 

We are really looking forward to revisiting some of our favorite canyon sites and exploring new ones.

… and on to Las Vegas to spend an extra night (on Tauck).

 

 

Sources

My principal sources included: “Sedona, Arizona,” “Oak Creek Canyon,” Glen Canyon National Recreation Area,” “Glen Canyon,” Bryce Canyon National Park,” “Zion National Park,” en.wikipedia.org; “History of Sedona,” sedonamuseum.org; “Oak Creek Canyon,” fs.usda.gov; “NPS Geodiversity Atlas - Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, Arizona and Utah,” nps.gov; “History94 - The North Rim of the Grand Canyon,” History104 - Crossing the Colorado River at Lees Ferry,” “History108 - Natural Wonders of Northern Arizona,” https://bobringreflections.blogspot.com/;  plus numerous other online sources.