Let us follow the pavement to Needles Overlook, from which fine morning
views of Canyonlands National Park can be seen to the south and west.
Northwestward (fig. 27) we look 10 miles across the Colorado River
canyon to Junction Butte and Grand View Point. (This view is along the
line of the east half of the cross section in fig. 10.) The feather edge
of the White Rim Sandstone caps the White Rim west of the Colorado
River, but the White Rim is absent on the east side of the canyon and in
the entire Needles district to the southwest, where the important scenic
features are carved from the underlying Cedar Mesa Sandstone Member of
the Cutler Formation, referred to hereinafter simply as the Cedar Mesa
Sandstone. Both these sandstones are missing in the foreground of figure
27—their place being taken by thin beds of red siltstone, mudstone, and
sandstone similar to those that comprise the Organ Rock Tongue shown
between the two sandstones in figure 22. These are additional examples
of facies changes mentioned earlier (p. 34).
[Illustration: JUNCTION BUTTE AND GRAND VIEW POINT, looking
northwest from Needles Overlook. (Fig. 27)]