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With views of magnificent landscapes and unusual geologic formations, the Hickman Bridge Trail is an excellent ways of becoming acquainted with Capitol Reef National Park. Although, as in much of Utah, one is starting well over sea level (5320 feet here), and higher altitudes can tire anyone quickly, the trail requires only 400 feet of ascent. Thus you can stretch your legs before serious hiking, as well as becoming accustomed to both higher altitudes and walking in the desert country (i.e., bring water).
Although I photographed a number of lizards, not to mention cactus flowers, the following eleven views are all scenery. The Hickman lizards will have their own page, and the cactus flowers that include various tones of red, yellow, and pink are also worth their own page.
The endpoint of the walk, the bridge itself, includes photos that I have to scan; those shown here are from my digital camera. Hickman Bridge will have to wait until next week.
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The trail begins next to some cliffs and the Fremont River: a beautiful and relaxing start. (The larger images - reached by clicking the thumbnails - vary in size from 25 to 75K and from 640 by 480 to 800 by 600 pixels.)
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The first oddity is soon apparent: the Loch Ness rockster.
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Many of the odd carvings are credited to various forms of wind erosion. Perhaps Capitol Reef specialized in miniature tornadoes during times past?
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This is a selection from the larger photo (instead of a size reduction) to show the rock strata: the bottom layers are pleasantly flat; the middle ones are angled; and top ones are flat again. It is perfectly natural to have angled layers on top of flat ones: from a retreating or advancing sea or lake or from a delta or an alluvial fan. But . . . how were the angled layers sheered off to become flat on the top?
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Never have I seen more varieties of huge, hollowed boulders than at Capitol Reef. Call it the Art Gallery of the Gods.
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And the set of erosion or chaos that formed this particular niche deserves very high marks.
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Those aren't depressions but tiny semispherical lumps on top of the sedimentary rock. Perhaps the positive impression of fossilized raindrops? (That is, sediment covered land marked by raindrops, became rock itself over millions of years, and then did a 180 to present its bottom side on the top. Simple.)
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The easy explanation is that an underground or intermittent stream carved its nitch through the rock; but equally interesting is how that tree (a juniper?) thrives on what is an otherwise bare rockface.
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More stream activity, I expect, but how beautiful!
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Looking back, with the the trail on the right.
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The view here is the way forward. Notice the face along the rock ledge? I call it "The Scream." Why? Because the Hickman Bridge is right ahead, of course.
Photography note: The photos were taken with a Sony F707.
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