Trip 2013: Trip 2013 Verde Vally,Sedona, Jarome, AZ and Monument Valley, Four Corners and Black Canyon of the Gunnison.

Another day on the road back to North Carolina, yes we are coming back. We stopped in Verde Valley Thousand Trails park for four days, while there we visited Sedona, the artist community and Jarome that had a Ghost Town. Here is a little information, Sedona /sɨˈdoʊnə/ is a city that straddles the county between Coconino and Yavapai counties in the northern Verde Valley region of the U.S. state of Arizona. As of the 2010 census, its population was 10,031. Sedona's main attraction is its array of red sandstone formations. The formations 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 spiritual pursuits to the hundreds of hiking and mountain biking trails. Sedona was named after Sedona Arabelle Miller Schnebly (1877–1950), the wife of Theodore Carlton Schnebly, the city's first postmaster, who was celebrated for her hospitality and industriousness. Jerome is a town in the Black Hills of Yavapai County, in the U.S. state of Arizona. Founded in the late 19th century on Cleopatra Hill, overlooking the Verde Valley, it is more than 5,000 feet (1,500 m) above sea level. It is about 100 miles (160 km) north of Phoenix along State Route 89A between Sedona and Prescott. Supported in its heyday by rich copper mines, it was home to more than 10,000 people in the 1920s. As of the 2010 census, its population was 444. The town owes its existence mainly to two ore bodies that formed about 1.75 billion years ago along a ring fault in the caldera of an undersea volcano. Tectonic plate movements, plate collisions, uplift, deposition, erosion, and other geologic processes eventually exposed the tip of one of the ore bodies and pushed the other close to the surface, both near Jerome. In the late 19th century, the United Verde Mine, developed by William A. Clark, extracted ore bearing copper, gold, silver, and other metals from the larger of the two. The United Verde Extension (UVX) Mine, owned by James Douglas, Jr., depended on the other huge deposit. In total, the copper deposits discovered in the vicinity of Jerome were among the richest ever found in any time or place. After leaving Verde Valley we headed to Monument Valley and this is the information about it Monument Valley (Navajo: Tsé Biiʼ Ndzisgaii, meaning valley of the rocks) is a region of the Colorado Plateau characterized by a cluster of vast sandstone buttes, the largest reaching 1,000 ft (300 m) above the valley floor. It is located on the Arizona-Utah state line near the Four Corners area. The valley lies within the range of the Navajo Nation Reservation and is accessible from U.S. Highway 163.

Monument Valley has been featured in many forms of media since the 1930s. Director John Ford used the location for a number of his best-known films, and thus, in the words of critic Keith Phipps, "its five square miles have defined what decades of movie goers think of when they imagine the American West." The area is part of the Colorado Plateau. The elevation of the valley floor ranges from 5,000 to 6,000 feet (1,500 to 1,800 m) above sea level. The floor is largely siltstone of the Cutler Group, or sand derived from it, deposited by the meandering rivers that carved the valley. The valley's vivid red color comes from iron oxide exposed in the weathered siltstone. The darker, blue-gray rocks in the valley get their color from manganese oxide.

The buttes are clearly stratified, with three principal layers. The lowest layer is the Organ Rock Shale, the middle is de Chelly Sandstone, and the top layer is the Moenkopi Formation capped by Shinarump Conglomerate. The valley includes large stone structures including the famed "Eye of the Sun". Monument Valley is officially a large area that includes much of the area surrounding Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, a Navajo Nation equivalent to a national park. Oljato, for example, is also within the area designated as Monument Valley.

Visitors may pay an access fee and drive through the park on a 17-mile (27 km) dirt road (a 2-3 hour trip). Parts of Monument Valley are accessible only by guided tour, such as Mystery Valley and Hunts Mesa. After leaving Monument Valley we had to make another stop at the The Four Corners this region of the United States consisting of the southwestern corner of Colorado, northwestern corner of New Mexico, northeastern corner of Arizona and southeastern corner of Utah. The Four Corners area is named after the quadripoint where the boundaries of the four states meet, where the Four Corners Monument is located. It is the only location in the United States where four states meet. The majority of the Four Corners region belongs to semi-autonomous Native American nations, the largest of which is the Navajo Nation, followed by Hopi, Ute, and Zuni tribal reserves and nations. The Four Corners region is part of a larger region known as the Colorado Plateau and is mostly rural, rugged and arid. In addition to the monument, commonly visited areas within Four Corners include Monument Valley, Mesa Verde National Park, and Canyon de Chelly National Monument. The most populous city in the Four Corners region is Farmington, New Mexico, followed by Durango, Colorado. The United States acquired the four corners region from Mexico after the end of the Mexican–American War in 1848. In 1863 Congress created Arizona Territory from the western part of New Mexico Territory. The boundary was defined as a line running due south from the southwest corner of Colorado Territory, which had been created in 1861. This was an unusual act of Congress, which almost always defined the boundaries of new territories as lines of latitude or longitude, or following rivers. By defining one boundary as starting at the corner of another Congress ensured the eventual creation of four states meeting at a point, regardless of the inevitable errors of boundary surveying. The area was first surveyed by the U.S. Government in 1868 as part of an effort to make Colorado Territory into a state, the first of the Four Corners states formed. The first marker was placed at the spot in 1912. The first Navajo tribal government was established in 1923 to regulate an increasing number of oil exploration activities on Navajo land. We then headed to Cortez,CO were we spent the night, the next day we headed to Montrose, CO where we went to the Montrose that was incorporated on May 2, 1882 and named after Sir Walter Scott's novel A Legend of Montrose. The Denver & Rio Grande railroad building west toward Grand Junction reached Montrose later in 1882, and the town became an important regional shipping center. A branch railroad line served the mineral-rich San Juan Mountains to the south.

In 1909 the US government completed construction of the Gunnison Tunnel, which provided irrigation water from the Gunnison Riverin the Black Canyon to the Uncompahgre Valley, helping turn Montrose into an agricultural hub. The Uncompahgre Project is one of the oldest of those in the area by the US Bureau of Reclamation.

Today the canal is also used for recreation: water rushing through the canal below the tunnel creates a kayak-surfing spot called the M-wave.^[10] Tourist and recreation opportunities are important to the regional economy. Montrose is a gateway to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park to the east of town; in the winter, it is a transportation hub for ski areas of the San Juan Mountains to the south. One of the side trips was to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park is a United States National Park located in western Colorado, and managed by the National Park Service. There are Three entrances to the park; the more-developed east entrance located 37 miles (59 km)east of Montrose and just west of Blue Mesa Reservoir by Blue Mesa Point, the south rim entrance is located 15 miles (24 km) east of Montrose, while the north rim entrance is located 11 miles (18 km) south of Crawford and is closed in the winter. The park contains 12 miles (19 km) of the 48-mile (77 km) long canyon of the Gunnison river. The national park itself contains the deepest and most dramatic section of the canyon, but the canyon continues upstream into the Curecanti National Recreation Area and downstream into the Gunnison Gorge National Conservation Area. The Gunnison River drops an average of 34 feet per mile (5 m/km) through the entire canyon, making the 5th steepest mountain descents in North America. In comparison, the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon drops an average of 7.5 feet per mile (1.4 m/km). The greatest descent of the Gunnison River occurs in the park at Chasm View dropping 240 feet per mile (45 m/km). The Black Canyon is so named on account of its steepness which makes it difficult for sunlight to penetrate very far down the canyon. As a result, the canyon walls are most often in shadow, causing the rocky walls to appear black. At its narrowest point the canyon is only 40 feet (12 m) across at the river.

The extremely narrow walls of the canyon

Overview Black Canyon with Gunnison River

The extreme steepness and depth of the Black Canyon formed as the result of several geologic processes acting together. The Gunnison River is primarily responsible for carving the canyon, though several other geologic events had to occur in order to form the canyon as it is seen today. The Black Canyon is a center for rock climbing, in a style known as traditional climbing. Most of the climbs are difficult and are only done by advanced climbers. Now you have a vast number of pictures for your viewing pleasure.