A wonderful little hike - less than two miles round trip - lies off Highway 89 just over the Utah border from Arizona. The reward at the end of the hike is a massive field of sandstone rocks in the form of mushrooms, or toadstools.

Actually rather common in this area, the toadstools can be found in several different areas of northern Arizona and southern Utah due to the type of rock - the white and red Navajo sandstone - that is abundant here.

But it's in this particular area - just within the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument - that wind and weather conditions are such that a high concentration of the formations are collected.

The toadstools are formed by the wearing away of the softer sandstone rock that supports a harder rock that doesn't wear away as quickly. Eventually, the softer rock underneath will not be able to support the top rock and will collapse.