Red Rock Route
She is drawn to the immense desert by the search for something intimate hiding and gleaming somewhere, like an unseen flower. With the gorgeous, blue sky surrounding every step and the wide free open landscape, her soul is left without expectations. Looking at rugged mountain faces through cactuses and tumbleweeds, she can guess the earth’s skin, backbone and angles. Then suddenly – like the line between life and death - night poured over the desert. In the purple air, the stars pierced out of the sky.
“All around me there was nothing but dust, rocks, and endless empty desert in all directions. The planet’s famous red color is from iron oxide coating everything. So it’s not just a desert. It’s a desert so old it’s literally rusting.” Andy Weir, The Martian
Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area lies in Nevada’s Mojave Desert. It’s known for geological features such as towering red sandstone peaks and the Keystone Thrust Fault, as well as Native American petroglyphs. Panoramic viewing spots dot the 13-mile Scenic Drive.
The red color of some of the outcrops of the Aztec Sandstone is due to presence of iron oxide or hematite. Exposure to the elements caused iron minerals to oxidize or “rust,” resulting in red, orange, and brown-colored rocks. Areas where the rock is buff in color may be places where the iron has been leached out by subsurface water, or where the iron oxide was never deposited.
