Fantasy Canyon is a canyon containing unusual rock formations that were created through erosion and weathering. It is located about south of Vernal, in

Uintah County Uintah County ( ) is a county in the U.S. state of Utah. As of the 2020 United States Census the population was 35,620. Its county seat and largest city is Vernal. The county was named for the portion of the Ute Indian tribe that lived in the b ...

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

, United States. Fantasy Canyon is managed by the

Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands. Headquartered in Washington DC, and with oversight over , it governs one eighth of the country's la ...

and is only accessible via the Fantasy Canyon Trail.

Description

Even though the area is only about in size, it contains some of the most unusual geologic features in the world. The site was officially documented by early explorer and paleontologist

Earl Douglass Earl Douglass (October 28, 1862 – January 13, 1931) was an American paleontologist who discovered the dinosaur ''Apatosaurus'', playing a central role in one of the most important fossil finds in North America. By 1922 Earl had unearthed and shi ...

, who recorded the area by other names such as "The Devil's Playground" and "Hades Pit." He published photographs of this area in a 1909 publication called ''The Columbian Magazine''. The canyon is accessed by the Fantasy Canyon Trail, also known as the Fantasy Canyon Loop trail.

Geology

The rocks of Fantasy Canyon, quartzose sandstones, were deposited during the

Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), Era. The name ''Eocene' ...

Epoch. They date from around 38 to 50 million years ago. During the geologic period, the Uinta Basin was occupied by a large lake called Lake Uinta. The lake extended west to

Heber City Heber City is a city and county seat of Wasatch County, Utah, United States. The population was 11,362 at the time of the 2010 census. It is located 43 miles southeast of Salt Lake City. History Heber City was first settled in 1859 by Robert ...

, east to Rangely,

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

, south to the Book Cliff Divide, north to the

Uinta Mountains The Uinta Mountains ( ) are an east-west trending chain of mountains in northeastern Utah extending slightly into southern Wyoming in the United States. As a subrange of the Rocky Mountains, they are unusual for being the highest range in the con ...

, and was about a deep. Stratigraphy: member C,

Uinta Formation The Uinta Formation is a Formation (geology), geologic formation in northeastern Utah. The name appears on a geologic map accompanying the Clarence King Fortieth Parallel report for 1876 but not defined until 1878 as the Uinta Group. As defined, ...

, Eocene. Fantasy Canyon is along the east shore of what was once Lake Uinta, where the sediments eroded from the surrounding high lands. Sediments were deposited and the once loose sands, silts, and clays were forged into sandstone and shale. Because of different rates of weathering, the more durable sandstone remained while the more easily weathered siltstone and shale washed away, yielding this spectacular scenery. Today's geologic formations of Fantasy Canyon will eventually give way to weather and then topple and erode into sand, but new formations will appear as the topsoil washes away. Because the delicate formations are so fragile the area is referred to as "Nature's China Shop." Names have been assigned to some of the rock formations, which resemble bleached-out coral,

gargoyle In architecture, and specifically Gothic architecture, a gargoyle () is a carved or formed grotesque with a spout designed to convey water from a roof and away from the side of a building, thereby preventing it from running down masonry walls ...

s, and

stalagmite A stalagmite (, ; from the Greek , from , "dropping, trickling") is a type of rock formation that rises from the floor of a cave due to the accumulation of material deposited on the floor from ceiling drippings. Stalagmites are typically ...

s. Many of the rock clusters are highly fragile. The "teapot formation" collapsed in 2006.

Mineralization

There are black ribbons of coal-like material along the small washes on the trail or as horizontal stripes in the rocks. This magnetic material is called

magnetite Magnetite is a mineral and one of the main iron ores, with the chemical formula Fe2+Fe3+2O4. It is one of the oxides of iron, and is ferrimagnetic; it is attracted to a magnet and can be magnetized to become a permanent magnet itself. With the ...

(iron oxide). There are inch-wide, black-colored, subvertical, northwest-southeast trending

gilsonite Asphaltite (also known as uintahite, asphaltum, gilsonite or oil sands) is a naturally occurring soluble solid hydrocarbon, a form of asphalt (or bitumen) with a relatively high melting temperature. Its large-scale production occurs in the Uintah ...

dikes that have intruded the rocks at Fantasy Canyon. Gilsonite, named after U.S. Marshall

Samuel H. Gilson Samuel ''Šəmūʾēl'', Tiberian: ''Šămūʾēl''; ar, شموئيل or صموئيل '; el, Σαμουήλ ''Samouḗl''; la, Samūēl is a figure who, in the narratives of the Hebrew Bible, plays a key role in the transition from the bibl ...

, is a type of asphaltite-solidified hydrocarbon. Gilsonite was discovered in the early 1860s. Starting in the mid-1880s, Gilson promoted the material as a waterproof coating for wooden pilings, as an insulation for wire cable, and as a unique varnish.

Fossils

The Eocene-aged Uinta Formation is fossiliferous. It contains widely scattered bones, mostly mammals, which roamed the Basin during the Eocene. Fossilized turtle shells are visible in the area.

References

External links