The question of how to see the park has no simple answer, for the park
is too vast and complex to comprehend by a quick visit to any one of its
many and varied parts or by any one means of transportation. Some, as
did Major Powell, view it only from the rivers—by boat plus a few
back-breaking climbs up the bordering canyon walls. Others see only the
small parts reachable by passenger cars. The more venturesome see vastly
more by jeep, foot, or horseback. And a few prefer to view it as the
birds do—from the air. Many, those who put aside their magazines long
enough, get bird’s-eye views without half trying, for Canyonlands is
beneath the principal air routes connecting Los Angeles with Grand
Junction and Denver. Actually, a full appreciation of all the wonders
and beauties of the park is possible only by combining all these
approaches and methods of locomotion, but only a few fortunate souls
such as Bates Wilson have thus been able to inspect virtually every
square foot of it.
The task clearly before me, then, is how best to present such a complex
wonderland to you, the reader. The method I selected, after considerable
thought and a few false starts, is to begin at the top—the high
mesas—and work my way downward much as the rivers have done in carving
out this fantastic area, to some of the broad benchlands beneath the
mesas and eventually to the river channels and deep canyons. Although
the approach I selected may not be the best, and admittedly is but one
of several that comes to mind, I hope it gets the job done.