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Honeycomb rock erosion, Grand Wash, Capitol Reef National Park, Utah, USA.

Hike through Grand Wash, in Capitol Reef National Park, Utah, USA. Capitol Reef National Park is centered upon the 100-mile-long Waterpocket Fold, the steep eastern limb of the Circle Cliffs Uplift, formed in Late Cretaceous time, during the Laramide Orogeny. Pressure caused by the subduction of the Farallon Plate beneath the North American Plate along the west coast caused several huge folds like this in southeast Utah, USA. Steeply tilted Triassic and Jurassic rocks form the hogbacks of the Waterpocket Fold and Capitol Reef, which is built of dark-red dune-formed Wingate Sandstone, thinly bedded river deposits of the Kayenta Formation, crested by the massive, white, dune-formed Navajo Sandstone. Honeycomb weathering: rainwater soaks into sandstone, dissolves its cement, and redeposits it near the surface as the water evaporates, forming a resistant outer layer, pockmarked with holes into the soft inner layers enlarged by wind and moisture.

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Utah: Capitol Reef National Park, 2015 Mar 3-Apr 8: all: Utah, Colorado hikes
Hike through Grand Wash, in Capitol Reef National Park, Utah, USA. Capitol Reef National Park is centered upon the 100-mile-long Waterpocket Fold, the steep eastern limb of the Circle Cliffs Uplift, formed in Late Cretaceous time, during the Laramide Orogeny. Pressure caused by the subduction of the Farallon Plate beneath the North American Plate along the west coast caused several huge folds like this in southeast Utah, USA. Steeply tilted Triassic and Jurassic rocks form the hogbacks of the Waterpocket Fold and Capitol Reef, which is built of dark-red dune-formed Wingate Sandstone, thinly bedded river deposits of the Kayenta Formation, crested by the massive, white, dune-formed Navajo Sandstone. Honeycomb weathering: rainwater soaks into sandstone, dissolves its cement, and redeposits it near the surface as the water evaporates, forming a resistant outer layer, pockmarked with holes into the soft inner layers enlarged by wind and moisture.
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