Can you imagine camping and watch a rainbow over the West Mitten Butte in Monument Valley? This was the view Carol "adobe" had a few days ago when she went tent camping on the Utah-Arizona border. I don't know if she say any rainbow but with or without it, i believe it was really great to have such a view.
Monument Valley 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 northern border of Arizona with southern Utah. The valley lies within the range of the Navajo Nation Reservation, and is accessible from U.S. Highway 163.
Monument Valley was created as material eroded from the ancestral Rocky Mountains, and was deposited and cemented into sandstone. The formations you see in the valley were left over after the forces of erosion worked their magic on the sandstone. A geologic uplift caused the surface to bulge and crack. Wind and water then eroded the land, and the cracks deepened and widened into gullies and canyons, which eventually became the scenery you see today.
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.
Monument Valley is officially a large area which 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 can pay an access fee and drive through the park on a 17-mile (27 km) dirt road (a 2-3 hour trip). Tours are also available, and the fee varies between about $40 and $100 per person depending on the services provided and route. - in: wikipedia
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