Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, BLM Kanab Visitor Center

The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is a United States national monument in southern Utah. This monument has rich native and prehistoric history. The beautiful area and monument are popular among outdoor enthusiasts. Opportunity for hiking, studying nature, and site seeing are common peaks of interest to visitors.

BLM Kanab Visitor Center is the main Grand Staircase visitor center, offering interpretive displays, opportunity for questions to be answered, and informational maps and brochures.  The Grand Staircase-Escalante spans throughout acres of public lands in which contains three distinct units. These unites are the Grand Staircase, Kaiparowits, and Escalante Canyon. This monument was the last place in the continental United States to be mapped. From the monument’s Grand Staircase of cliffs and terraces, across the rugged Kaiparowits Plateau, to the Escalante River Canyons, this monument is a diverse geologic treasure that is speckled with monoliths, slot canyons, natural bridges, and arches.

The Grand Staircase-Escalante Monument is an outstanding biological resource. It spans five life-zones from low-lying desert to coniferous forest. Within its deep, vast, and austere landscape, the Anasazi and Fremont cultures made contact in the period AD 950-1100. They left behind rock art panels, occupation sites, campsites and granaries. Further back in time, fossil excavations have yielded more information regarding ecosystem change at the end of the dinosaur era than any other place in the world. 

The Grand Staircase-Escalante Monument’s size, resources, and remote character provides extraordinary opportunities for geologists, paleontologists, archaeologists, historians, and biologists when it comes to scientific research, education, and exploration. This unspoiled, natural area remains a frontier with countless opportunities for various recreation and solitude. Recreation includes hiking among waterfalls, arches, canyons, and backcountry.

Bureau of Land Management. 2018.The Grand Staircase-Escalante Monument. Website.
https://www.blm.gov/programs/national-conservation-lands/utah/grand-staircase-escalante-national-mon...