Our trip to Gold Butte National Monument took us to:
Little Finland (also known as Hobgoblin's Playground and Devil'sFire),
7 Keyholes Canyon,
and Devils Throat
We had an easy stop (i.e. no climbing) before reaching Little Finland
good Petroglyphs
Little Finland has such interesting shapes of the sandstone formed by erosion into 'thin fins' (nothing to do with the country of Finland.)
Our first entrance shows the steep sides of the sandstone and the expanse of the area.
Note the size of the people in the distance.
Surprising to see all these palm trees along the base of the rocks and the deep cracks along the entire base.
So many intriguing shapes-
The lunch bunch - we had 13 vehicles and 2 dogs today.
(all well behaved!)
This stop is into the
7 Keyholes Canyon.
After parking at the top and a short but steep trail down,
the rest of the trail was very easy.
The split in the sandstone rock has resulted in
hollowed out bottom section giving shapes similar to Zion's Subway Canyon.
Since there is so little water in this region,
we wonder how it gets its unique shape.
You can see why it got the name,
Keyhole Canyon
and now - a petrified giant lizard??
Last stop is Devil's Throat.
The Devil’s Throat is a great example of geology in action. In the early 1900’s, during the Gold Butte mining boom, cowboys and miners in the area suddenly saw a large cloud of dust off in the distance. Upon investigation, they found a large sinkhole where once had been open desert! The sinkhole, known as the Devil’s Throat, has grown over the years, and is currently between 110-120' across and quite deep. It is immense!
Heading home.
On the way out we were lucky enough to see a few wild burros.
The story is that the miners left the area when the mining era ended,
but left their burros to survive.
(its always a wonder that they do because the area is so immense and dry)
