Park Avenue

— I love doing this kind of shopping: nature shopping. Whenever things get hectic at work, and I need to recharge my internal batteries, a nature fix gets the job done. Whether biking or hiking, open spaces do wonders for me.

During our Utah national park vacation, the fifth park we visited was Arches National Park. Arches was established as a national monument on April 12, 1929, and on November 12, 1971, it became a national park. The park is famous for the many arches scattered throughout its 76,519 acres or 119 square miles (30,966 ha or 308 square km). There is no accurate count of the number of arches in the park, but over 2,000 have already been recorded. The sandstone formations in the park get their red color because they contain iron oxide.

When we first drove into the park, we decided to hike the easy trail known as Park Avenue. The trail is only a mile long and offers incredible views of some of the most impressive rock formations. The trail’s name comes from the fact that the large formations resemble the tall buildings on Park Avenue in New York City. Hiking this trail offers visitors views of the Three Gossips, the Courthouse Towers, Queen Nefertiti and Queen Victoria Rock, the Organ, and the Tower of Babel.