Arches, Canyonlands and Natural Bridges. Arches National Park is of course famous for the red sandstone arches that occur there in great profusion. The visitor centre sells a map showing the location of over 1000 of them, ranging in size from Landscape Arch (with an 89-metre span) to small openings one metre across. However, there are also many other striking rock formations scattered over the Park’s 73,000 acres, and to see the whole area would take several days.
Rocks in Window Section
The Park entrance is on US191, 20 miles south of I-70 and just north of Moab, which is the biggest town in southeast Utah and seems to be mainly full of motels and mountain-bike shops. This town, which was originally a centre for the uranium-mining industry, is close to several National Parks, including Canyonlands NP and the Colorado NM as well as Arches. It is a starting point for many boat trips down the Colorado River.
The park road climbs up a steep cliff with several sharp switchbacks and then winds for 25 miles through the sculptured red rocks passing close to many of the major features. The road passes Park Avenue and Courthouse Towers, monolithic spires and ridges of rock standing isolated in largely flat desert terrain. These have been featured in several cinema films, most recently Thelma and Louise. The Windows Section contains a major concentration of arches and other formations, which have self-explanatory names such as Double Arch, Cove Arch and Balanced Rock. Everything in this area can be seen either from the road or along short hikes.
Delicate Arch
The Canyonlands area was only designated a National Park in 1964. Before that, most of the terrain was unvisited, and also largely inaccessible. Much of it is still largely inaccessible; although there are now some paved roads. The best way to see most of the park is by 4WD vehicle, but most roads are very rough, and huge areas have no roads at all. Far fewer tourists come to this park than to others in Utah.
From Wolfe Ranch, a 1.5-mile foot trail crosses the creek via a small, swaying suspension bridge and leads across smooth exposed slickrock to the especially scenic Delicate Arch. This is the most famous arch in the park and has been adopted as the state symbol, appearing on Utah Centennial vehicle registration plates.
View some related video clips below.
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