Antelope Canyon

Description of Antelope Canyon

Location: Page, Arizona Map

Depth: 120 feet (37 meters)

Antelope Canyon is a canyon located in the southwestern United States, in northern Arizona, near the city of Page, near the border with Utah, 240 km from the Grand Canyon. The canyon got its name due to the reddish-red walls, reminiscent of the skin of an antelope. Antelope Canyon is not a national park and is less well known than the Grand Canyon or Bryce Canyon. It lies on the lands of the Navajo tribe and belongs to the Indians of this tribe. To get there, you need to pay a toll for passing through Indian territory and hire a guide. There are two Antelope canyons - upper and lower. They are famous among photographers all over the world because of the bizarre shape of the rocks, illuminated by a delightful magical light. Both canyons are naturally formed giant cracks in the sandstone massif. For a long time, water and wind carved depressions in the red sandstone for several hundred meters. Once every few years, during heavy rains, each canyon, which usually dries up during the year, is flooded with water. It was rainwater, slowly flowing down and carrying away grains of sand, that for many years formed these graceful relief lines inside the rocks.

Antelope Canyon lies four miles east of town on Highway 98, between the town of Page and a large coal-fired power plant. The power plant is impossible to miss, it is visible for tens of miles before reaching the city. There are Upper Antelope Canyon and Lower Antelope Canyon signs next to the road, but these are not standard American road signs, but handwritten signs, so they can be easily missed.

The best time to visit is in spring and autumn: March-April and October-November. At this time, the sun's rays penetrate to the very bottom and the canyons look like a bright light is burning inside a dark palace. In winter, the lighting in the canyons is rather weak - it is quite gloomy inside, deep shadows and flat reliefs. For winter photography, it is desirable to install additional lighting.

The climate is continental. Summers are hot, dry, with low rainfall. The average temperature is +30-35 C°, the maximum is +47 C°. Winter is mild, not cold. Usually the air temperature is not lower than 0 С°, but sometimes cold air masses come from Canada, and then the air temperature drops to minus, snow falls.

Geology

Antelope Canyon belongs to the so-called slot canyons. It was formed by the erosion of Navaja sandstone. Geologists call the causes of erosion, firstly, sudden floods, and secondly, subaerial processes. Rainwater, especially during the monsoon season, enters the vast pool above the sections of the slot canyon and picks up speed and mixes with the sand into the narrow passages of the canyon. For a long time, the passages in the rock were destroyed, becoming deeper and smoothing out, acquiring characteristic "smooth" forms. Today, floods in the canyon occur more and more often. The most recent flood occurred on October 30, 2006 and lasted 36 hours, forcing the park authorities to close Lower Antelope Canyon for 5 months.

Photography in Antelope Canyon

Antelope Canyon is a popular destination for photographers and tourists, as well as a source of business tourism primarily for the Navajo Indians. The pass to Indian territory, to Antelope Canyon, has been open only since 1997, when the Navajo tribe made their territory a restricted tribal park. Photography within canyons is difficult to create due to the wide range of brightness (often 10 EV or more) made easy by the reflection of the canyon walls.

The colors seen in the photographs do not always fully correspond to what the living human eye sees in Antelope Canyon. This is a strange place, the photos of which can look even more beautiful and mysterious than reality. The blue tones of deep shadows appear only in the pictures, apparently the human brain filters out this blue when looking at the canyon at dusk. You need to be prepared for the fact that you will have to shoot with shutter speeds of several tens of seconds or more to obtain a large depth of field. When photographing using bracketing, shooting takes place in different modes, which helps to hide exposure meter errors. Due to the constant use of tripod bracketing, you can get several shots with different worked areas of the same angle, which allows you to combine images in a raster graphics editor when processed on a computer and get amazing results. Pictures taken in Antelope Canyon are especially attractive to the viewer. The best time to take pictures is in the middle of the day when the sun is at its zenith. For the Lower Canyon, the best time is before noon and immediately after (from 10 am to 11 am or from 1 pm to 2 pm), and for the Upper Canyon, the best time around noon is from 11 am to 1 pm. This is due to the fact that the Upper Canyon is deeper and the light penetrates there less, and in the Lower Canyon at noon there is too much direct light and the magic disappears.

Upper Antelope Canyon

The Upper Canyon is about 200 m long and 37 m deep. Named by the Navajo tribe Tse bighanilini, "The place where water runs through the rocks," it is most frequently visited by tourists because of two features. The first is that the entrance and the entire length of this part of the canyon are at ground level and do not require climbing. The second, rays (direct sunlight coming from holes at the top of the canyon) are much easier to see here in the Upper Canyon than in the Lower. Rays are more often observed in summer, since this requires the Sun to be as high as possible in the sky.

Upper Antelope Canyon is very beautiful. In winter, the colors are a little more muted. During the summer months, two types of lighting are available for taking photographs. Deep reds, blues and purples can be obtained during morning and mid-afternoon tours. Rays of light begin to penetrate the canyon from March 15th and disappear by October 7th. The period of greatest illumination lasts from May to September.

Lower Antelope Canyon

The Lower Antelope Canyon, called the Hasdeztwazi, or "Spiral Arches of Rock" by the Navajo tribe, lies a few kilometers beyond the Upper Canyon. Its length is 407 m. Before the installation of metal ladders, visiting the canyon had to climb and descend on ropes and very dangerous rope ladders in certain areas. Even after the ladders were installed, the Lower Antelope Canyon hike was significantly more difficult than the Upper Antelope Canyon hike—the route is longer, narrower in places, and in some places you can't even stand on your feet. At the end of the route you need to climb several long flights of stairs.

Despite these limitations and the equally astonishing terrain of the Upper Canyon, the Lower Antelope Canyon is a much stronger attraction for photographers who want to capture it on film. Lighting here is best in the early hours of the morning or late in the afternoon.

Flood danger

Antelope Canyon can only be visited with a guide, because during the rainy season there is a danger of rapid flooding. During a thunderstorm or even with slight signs of its occurrence, it is strictly forbidden to go down into the canyon - the probability of a sudden flood is too high. On August 12, 1997, 12 tourists were washed away in the Lower Canyon, 11 of whom died.

Antelope Canyon in culture
Britney Spears has released a music video for her 2001 song "I'm Not a Girl, Not Yet a Woman". The clip takes place in the Upper Antelope Canyon.
Episodes of some films also show Antelope Canyon, in particular the Upper Canyon. Among such films is the 1996 film Broken Arrow starring Christian Slater and John Travolta.

Tourism

Antelope Canyon is a "slot canyon", a narrow chasm in erosions in sandstone. Years of water and sand has rounded the edges to form curves and flowing shapes in the rock. Photographers love the beauty and unique shapes and lighting conditions of the canyons. Flash flooding still occurs in the canyon and may, at times, result in up to several months of closing. Since 1997 the area has been accessible only by permit as it is now a Navajo Tribal Park.

Entrance Station Hours, Coppermine Rd. (Navajo Route 20). Summer (March-Oct) 8AM-5PM. Station is closed Nov - Feb, but Lower and Upper Antelope Canyon are both open. Office Hours M-F 8AM-5PM. Entry Fees: Adults $6; under 8: free. No camping is allowed in the park. Access is by guided tour only.
Antelope Canyon Park Office, ☎ +1 928 698-2808, fax: +1 928 698-3360, e-mail: ac@navajonationparks.org. The office is located three miles south of Page, Information and permits can be obtained for Water Holes Canyon and the Rainbow Bridge trails.
Navajo Village Heritage Center, 1253 Coppermine Rd, ☎ +1 928 660-0304.