The Hoodoos of Bryce Canyon
"George!" Tim Smith, the gentleman from Minnesota who used to live in upscale La Jolla and went to UC San Diego for college answered. I did not hear any reaction nor comment from James.
James went on to say something about cattle that belonged to Mr. Bryce getting lost among the hoodoos. James sort of reinforced what came to mind when I heard the word hoodoos. The Paiutes (pronounced as pa-i-yot), the Native American tribe who inhabited the area before the Mormons found the place, believed that spirits were trapped inside the hoodoos. James made it sound like hoodoos are some voodoos.
Named after Ebenezer Bryce, a Mormon pioneer, Bryce Canyon which is not really a canyon but an eroding plateau became a national monument in 1923. Professor Frederick Pack of Utah described Bryce Canyon as nature's "most delicate jewel". The hoodoos' life span are said to be 100 years, at the most.
Before Mormon pioneers like Ebenezer Bryce made a homestead out of the Paunsaugunt Plateau, Paiute Natives occupied the area for seasonal hunting and gathering activities. Instead of mispronouncing the name of the tribe that occupied the plateau as "pa-iyot", they are referred to as the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah or PITU. Indian Dick, a Paiute elder explained the Bryce Canyon legend about hoodoos and voodoos to a park naturalist in 1936, eight years after the canyon that is not really a canyon became Bryce Canyon National Park.
So here's the Paiute story in my own words: Before Adam and Eve were created into the image and likeness of God as documented in the Old Testament, the Legend People who could have been Paiute ancestors lived by what became known as the Pausaugunt Plateau. There were many of the Legend People and there were many kinds who were actually birds, lizards and animals, but they looked like people. Coyote was the leader of the Legend People. The Legend People who did something bad like stealing something were turned into rocks by Coyote. The bad Legend People are now seen as hoodoo formations, some standing in rows and holding each others' hands, hugging, sitting down or sculpted through the years in intimate Paiute activities.
Tim Smith might have been referring to George A. Smith. The late George A. Smith belonged to the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-day Saints St. George City was named after the George A. Smith who, of course, became a latter day saint upon his death. I'm sure Mitt Romney would one day be St. Mitt like George A. Smith when he becomes an immortal like St. George.
The Virgin River Gorge section of I-15 is a 29-mile scenic passage which happens to be the shortest Arizona highway. Designated as the Veterans Memorial Highway, the section is carved out of a terrain which would have separated Nevada from Utah. The highway that starts just past the U.S.-Mexico border, a few miles drive from my home, goes all the way to Montana and crosses over to Canada and goes all the way to Alberta, Canada. I have just crossed out hiking the more than 2,600 miles Pacific Crest Trail from the Mexican border into the Canadian border for a road trip of almost 2,000 miles to visit my friend Vi in Edmonton someday.
The abandoned house stands by itself in the middle of nowhere along the Arizona strip of I-15. The middle of nowhere is actually Littlefield, Arizona which is in the vicinity of the Virgen River. Virgen River was named in honor of Thomas Virgen, another member of the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints. The river named after Thomas Virgen became Virgin River sometime later.
Isolated by mountain ranges, canyons and an array of geographical wonders, Littlefield is sandwiched between Nevada and Utah. It is of no surprise that when the man brought his bride home to the house he built along the Virgin River Gorge, she quickly abandoned him, including the house.
Native Americans who were referred to as Paleoindian hunters and gatherers inhabited what became Utah some 12,000 years ago. Sometime later, groups living in the great basins of Colorado namely the Shoshones, Utes, Southern Paiutes and Goshutes began moving southwest into the mountains, high plateaus and deserts that form most of Utah's landscape.
James Marvin Phelps was repeating what I have learned during my visit to Sedona, Arizona as we stopped for pictures by the arch gateway of the Red Canyon along Highway 12, Utah's scenic byway. Utah being part of the Great Basin used to be an inland ocean about 4 billion years ago. The rocks of Utah such as those other rock formations along the Great Basin which now constitute the present day Nevada, Utah, Arizona, Colorado and some parts California, Idaho and Montana, are a result of volcanic eruptions, melting glaciers and swamps drying up not because of the global warming espoused by former Vice-President Al Gore despite his former professor's warning at UCSD that the greenhouse effect theory could not be proved.
Hoodoos are also commonly preferred as goblins. Their size range from 5 feet to 150 feet and they are formed from Claron Limestone. Hoodoos are described as tall skinny spires of rock protruding from the basins or eroded plateaus. At the Bryce Canyon National Park, hoodoos are formed from the eroding edges of the Paunsaugunt Plateau. The plateau was created by a geologic uplift of the Colorado River 10 to 20 million years ago. The orange tinge of hoodoos is the result of minerals deposited within different rock types in the plateau.
Plateaus become fins and fins turned into windows before they become hoodoos. Hoodoos are continuously formed by freeze and thaw cycles all through the year. In wintertime, snow seeps and expands into the cracks and when it thaws, cracks widen into holes from gradual erosion. Rain sculpts hoodoos.
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