Rimrock Hoodoos
Today was our final day of exploration. Our main goal was to photograph the Rimrock
Hoodoos area. The new signage calls the area The Toadstools, but I like its original name. Like so many other destinations on this trip, we had to drive 45 miles to reach the Rimrock Hoodoos.
We drove south on Highway 89 toward Page, AZ. From the small, dirt parking lot, the area didn't look very promising. The trail wound up the wash toward a sandstone canyon wall in the distance.
Because it was dry, we hiked up the wash rather than using the trail that climbed up and down the ridges. We turned a corner in the wash and saw the main hoodoo formation for the first time.
What made this area different from all the other hoodoos and toadstools we've seen on this trip was the sharp contrast between the clay-red color of the hoodoos against
a white sandstone background. The toadstools are nearly all found in a red sandstone layer sandwiched between two white sandstone layers.
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After we photographed the main hoodoo formation (it needs a name), we continued to the back wall of the basin. Giant toadstools rose out of a veneer of red sandstone that covered the floor of the white sandstone basin. It was only when we got close to the toadstools that we realized their scale. They completely dwarfed Carol when she stood beside them. Most of the toadstools were red sandstone with a harder red capstone, but one large hoodoo showed its individuality by being white with a red capstone.
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Paria Township
The old movie set at the Paria township was a our second stop. The town of Paria (may also be called Pareah) was founded in 1870 and grew to include 47 families. Flooding during the 1880's doomed Paria to becoming a ghost town. The film industry discovered Paria and used the area for movies that included Sergeants 3 and The Outlaw Josie Wales. It was also used for some episodes of "Gunsmoke."
We photographed the movie set and the amazing striped hills that served as its backdrop when we were here in 1997, and we were looking forward to photographing the old wooden buildings again. The dirt road leading from the highway dropped down off the ridge, turned a corner, and crossed the wash. The movie set was gone. Vandals burned down the movie set in 2006. Flash floods have wiped out any remaining signs of the movie set, and the wash now meanders across the area where Old Paria once stood. The striped hills of the Chinle Formation still loom over the wash in colors that don't seem real, but it's not the same without the movie set.
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While we were waiting for sunset, I walked about a mile down the wash to the old cemetery from the 1890's. There were about 20 headstones whose carved inscriptions are now illegible. Relatives of some of those buried in the cemetery later erected a memorial to the family members buried there and surrounded the cemetery with an iron fence.
By the time I got back to the Explorer, the sun was beginning to set. High cirrus clouds crisscrossed the skies in the west. After nearly 8 weeks, we were finally getting a
sunset. Weather has certainly been a mixed bag for this trip. We've had great, cool weather for hiking, but we've also had either cloudless, blue skies or completely overcast skies.
Neither situation works well for good images.
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