The Castle — Local services in Four Corners States

The Castle. What attracted my eye was not the limestone castle formation on top, but the dark red striated column base with the Navajo sandstone caps. The colors were eye popping. The second photo is of the rock wall behind an orchard in Fruita. In 1880, Mormon settlers came and established Fruita, a small farming community, which is still there. These settlers planted fruit trees and crops and ran cattle. Some of their ruins remain and it is possible to pick apples from a few of the original surviving apple trees. Most of the Mormons had left before 1969 and Congress designated Capitol Reef a National Park in 1971. Today, Fruita is where the Visitor Center is, and camping is allowed there. There are some historically recreated homes and a U-Pick-It place for the orchards. since this area was so over-crowded, we didn't care to stop except to use the facilities at the Visitor Center. There are no other...

This is a cool land formation. I hear there is a trail that was discontinued but still has the Cairns and markers that walks round this that is really pretty. I ran out of time, but I think if you had an external GPS and a a downloaded Gaia map it would be a fun trail to try out. Not sure why the discontinued adding it to the National Park map. I heard it is really nice. Maybe because you can see part of it...

At this point you can see the geological layers very clearly as described on the bord. The pictures of the visitors center are not located precisely because the center is a little...