Thenaturalmedic Adventures
Hello there, and thanks so much for joining us here! You are probably wondering what this podcast is all about? In this podcast, we will talk about all sorts of outdoor adventures, but primarily, for now, we will focus on hiking and backpacking. No other outdoor adventure is so accessible to so many people! So please join us as we talk about how to hike/backpack and learn how to hike any length trail from your local neighborhood parks to those long trails such as the Appalachian and others worldwide! Remember... "in every walk with nature; one receives far more than he seeks... - John Muir " See you on the trail!
Thenaturalmedic Adventures
See Why Colorado National Monument Should Be on Your Bucket List
Note: Audio Only; see video version for whole experience!
Colorado National Monument is a breathtaking destination that deserves a spot on every adventurer's bucket list. In this engaging episode, we explore its stunning landscapes and the fascinating history surrounding its creation. We also discover the impact of John Otto, the monument's trailblazer, and hear captivating stories about his dedication to preserving this extraordinary place for future generations.
We learn about unique formations such as Independence Monument and the Kissing Couple as we hike along iconic trails like the Canyon Rim Trail and Otto’s Trail. We delve into the geological wonders that make this area unique, unraveling the stunning scenery shaped by millions of years of natural forces. Join us as we share our personal experiences and insights while encouraging you to explore this magnificent monument yourself.
Whether you're a seasoned hiker or just curious about nature’s beauty, this episode is for you. Tune in and let the call of adventure inspire your next trip. Have you visited the Colorado National Monument? Please share your thoughts with us, and don’t forget to subscribe for more exciting journeys!
Hey there, this is Craig the Natural Medic. I'm at Colorado National Monument today, outside of Grand Junction in Fruita, colorado. Interesting little national monument that's not very large it's like 20,000 acres but protects some interesting places outside the towns of Grand Junction and Fruita. I stopped at the historic trail and, according to the sign, they used to drive cattle up this side. Can you imagine that? I hope you'll stick around and check this out. Okay, I'm pretty much on top of the Colorado National Monument. I'm at a place called Distant View, so you can see a lot of landmarks in the area Just below us. You can see the Colorado River. You can see the Grand Valley, which includes Grand Junction and Fruita. In the distance you have what's called the Book Cliffs, which is this row of cliffs on the eastern side of the valley. Then over here you have what's called the Grand Mesa, which is a big uplifted mesa. It's about 5,000 feet higher than the valley floor and it's a very durable surface that was able to keep it elevated and not eroding like the other formations around here.
Speaker 1:I'm at the visitor center at Colorado National Monument and this is a man known as John Otto. He was a trail builder, promoter and first custodian of the park. He advocated for making this area into a national park Per recommendation of one of the volunteers inside. She said to hike the canyon rim trail and the autos trail, both of which are pretty short and can be done just a little bit. Here is the canyon rim. As you may have thought, it goes along the canyon rim here. I don't think it's paved the entire way, but this first part goes down these steps. You have a choice to go to the book cliff overlook, which is the canyon rim trail end, or all the way to window rock, which is about a mile. One way decide. I want to do that, we'll see. Wow, very pretty. The rim rock road goes right along the flat part. Right here you can see where it goes along the top of the canyon. Otto's Trail is over there. The access point for that goes out to the end of this point. We'll be looking at that in a minute, but for now let's check out the Canyon Rim Trail and possibly the Window Trail.
Speaker 1:One of the interesting things about Colorado National Monument is being right here by Grand Junction and Fruita. When John Otto arrived here in 1907 he realized this was a really special place and he did what he could to entice the local people to get the legislation passed to make this into a national park. It's still not a national park. It's actually a national monument, but it's under designation and jurisdiction of the National Park Service and jurisdiction of the National Park Service. The first problem they had was making access for people to get up here, because once it was made a national monument successfully in 1911, there was no easy way to get up here except by foot or on horseback.
Speaker 1:Wow, look at that view, isn't that crazy? See Grand Mesa in the distance. Distance there. Zoom in a little bit way out there. Wow, some lovely views out here on the canyon rim. Nice, calm weather today and not too cold. It's in the 40s. You can see right over there, to the right of that spire. There is an overlook. I believe that's the end of Otto's Trail, which is next on my list to do after this one.
Speaker 1:Here we are right below the Park Road, rimrock Road, some very old stones. They used to make a retaining wall. The drive is right on this side. Look, there's a shelter right here. This might be the Book Cliffs shelter, where you can see the window rock further down. Let's go check it out. I might have incorrectly called this the Book Rock, but it's Book Cliffs shelter, built in 1964 by then and placed in the National Registry of Historic Places. How cool. So a couple of interesting spots here. At the Book Cliff Shelter you have the sacred landscape used by the Utes here.
Speaker 1:This was a hunting ground area. They found evidence. If you see right here, on the bottom left, there's a scraper. It's about 5,600 years old. It was found in the farthest reaches of the park, known as no Thru-A-Fair Canyon. But when John Otto saw this he thought of this as the heart of the world. You have several named features here To the right, leaning over towards the end of the auto trail. It's called the Pipe Organ. Then you have Praying Hands down here below. Independence Monument is right here. Behind it you have the Kissing Couple. Not sure when this book cliffs shelter was built, but it's got an interesting look to it with the graveled roof and the interesting angles. The structure itself is just neat looking.
Speaker 1:As you see, I'm going through here on December 17th 2024 and there's a little bit of ice here. Don't have my yak tracks, but I'm going to slog through here. Definitely a different view. Here You've got the organs, the Independence Rock, the kissing people All that from a different perspective. And then you've got these walls over here. And then look down here You've got a window rock. How cool is that? This ends the Canyon Rim Trail. Took a little bit under an hour to go all the way to the windows and come back About 1.62 miles.
Speaker 1:So for this last trail of the day here at Colorado National Monument, I'm going to do Otto's Trail, which is very short but very scenic, and this is one that John created himself. Let's go check it out. One thing you'll notice is the visitor center is over there. There's an overlook right there that I was standing on previously Window rock. It's around the corner over there. You can see the book cliff shelter right there. Okay, I've reached the end of Otto's trail. If you can only do one trail at this park, this is the one. So let's look at the view here. We'll flip this around. This is Independence Rock in all of its glory. It says on the sign that John started a tradition in 1911 that every 4th of July someone goes up and puts a flag on top of it. I'm here in December so I won't see that, but maybe someday I can come back on July 4th and check it out. We've got the backside of the pipe organ right here in front of us. Over here, against this cliff, is Sentinel Spires and then in the distance you can see the Window Rock, which I was close to before. Pretty neat. And of course, down below you have the town of Fruita and Grand Junction. You might be able to see Interstate 70 down there as well. Pretty cool.
Speaker 1:So a couple more interesting things about John. He was married at the base of Independence Monument in 1911. He wanted to live close to his livestock and his wife didn't last but by a few weeks. He did become the first custodian of the park. That was before they called managers or park superintendents, and his salary was one dollar a month. His route, if you want to look at it on the map or on the picture, goes up there, followed natural cracks and chimneys. He did insert pipes, still used as Otto's route today, but the pipes have been removed for safety. One thing I did notice is there's more ice and snow on this because there's more shaded spots than there is on the canyon rim trail.
Speaker 1:Use caution. Depending on when you come up here, if it's wintertime, definitely some different views than you would have gotten on the other side, so that was Otto's Trail. It was about three quarters of a mile round trip Took me about 26 minutes, including time to dilly-dally at the point and film a little bit. Use caution. Use caution during inclement weather such as snow and ice. Make sure to pack some traction devices. Overall, not too bad of a hike, not really challenging. You're already up here on top of the monument, so not a big deal. Okay, we're going to continue driving down the Rimrock Road on top of Colorado National Monument. Here we go In climbing independence. Ray Kennedy was Otto's climbing partner. He had a photographer named Whipple Chester. He was the first person to summit Independence Monument. He had been five years in the area was able to get support. President William H Taft establishing Colorado National Monument. You can see here people follow this same route and go to the top every year.
Speaker 1:Independence Monument over time has been shaped in certain ways. You have Wedding Canyon here in front of us, which is where they got married. The future Independence Monument will be straight ahead. As with most things in the desert southwest Erosion and weathering had an important part of the story here. If you look on this bottom, rendering Monument Canyon was to the right Streams went through carving of, freezing and melting. Independence Monument what it is today. Independence Monument what it is today. We're getting a backside view of the Independence Monument. This is from the Grand View area.
Speaker 1:You can see this formation made up of three different layers. The very topmost layer is the Cayenta, the Wingate is the majority of it and the bottom is the chinley and here here in the foreground, this particular which I believe is the kissing couple. The top of it is kayenta and the wing gate. Then if you shift your view over here you have kayenta on top, wingate, chinle. The environments that this stuff was deposited in varied quite a bit because they took a long time. The Kayenta formation, which is on top of that cliff over there, is more resistant to erosion. It's more of a cap rock type deal Deposited by a high-energy braided river system similar to Rio Grande in New Mexico. The next layer was deposited in a desert environment like North Africa and which is down there in the. The bottom most portion was deposited in more of a jungle type environment, similar to coastal environments of South Africa or South America.
Speaker 1:Pretty interesting, definitely glad I stopped with this grand view to get a good view as the sun's going down. So I'm at the Coke Ovens Overlook. Interesting thing about it is they're actually not Coke Ovens. It's interesting in our mind's eye what we can see from shapes in the landscape and the people that first saw this looked like Coke Ovens. And the landscape and the people that first saw this looked like coke ovens. And coke ovens, in case you're wondering, look like this on the sign. They are man-made structures that were used to transform coal into coke, which is a fuel that produces little or no gas when burned. Certainly an interesting approach to this a palette of color showing the primary rock colors, the lichens, the desert varnish, calcite coat, calcite coating, etc. And you can see that if you look out into the rocks. I'm sure this has been an inspiration to artists.
Speaker 1:So this stop is talking about woodland relationships. There is a food web of sorts that takes place. The forests here, especially the juniper, are thought to be very old, like a thousand years old. Some of the trees and some of the pinyon pines are thought to be about 600 years old. Pretty cool to think about. This is a thing called fallen rock. It's a named formation and you can see where it's, almost like an iceberg. It's calved off the side of the, the rock there, and just laid there. Instead of falling face first, it just slid off and, contrary to what you might think, it probably slid off over many centuries instead of just seconds. So it didn't just suddenly fall off and there it was, nearing a close to our adventure today. The Redlands Fault lifted this up about 70 to 40 million years ago. Over here you can see the Grand Mesa through the trees, the dominant species of trees here Utah, juniper and the pinyon.
Speaker 1:What you're looking at was the original auto road that took people up on top of the monument. It was so twisty. They called it the crookedest road in the world, the Serpent's Trail. Most vehicles in that day did not have a fuel pump. They were all gravity driven. They had to drive up this trail backwards in order for things to work. Pretty crazy to think about the trail. Now you can actually hike the old auto route. The new route is right here where these people are walking, which is Rimrock Road, 23 mile road that goes along the spine of the plateau here and is much easier to travel for automobiles.
Speaker 1:However, it did take them 20 some odd years to build it. It did take them 20 some odd years to build it. They started building it in the 30s and got it finally completed in 1950. This is the end of our adventure for today. What did you think about colorado national monument? Did you like it? If you did give it a thumbs up, think about subscribing to the channel if you want more content like this. Have you ever been here before? Have you ever even heard of it? Leave me your comments below. Let me know if you've visited the park before, if you've been to this area before, and any questions you might have. Hope you enjoyed our little pass-through today. Some of them are in various states of accessibility due to snow and ice right now. I'm sure it's only going to get worse.
