170 GUIDEBOOK OF THE WESTERN UNITED STATES 
in detail. A very interesting section of the strata“ is presented in 
the foothills north of Portal, Ariz., a small settlement and resort 10 
miles northwest of Rodeo. (See fig. 43.) 
The canyon of Cave Creek just above Portal has been called the 
Yosemite of Arizona, on account of its great beauty. It is walled 
with magnificent white cliffs 1,000 to 2,000 feet high, which have 
been eroded into a great variety of castled and pinnacled forms. 
The rock is a massive latite, the product of a great volcanic outflow 
in Tertiary time. The canyon is extremely narrow and tortuous and 
contains a charming typical mountain stream. There is a good road 
extending up the canyon and finally crossing the mountain to Sulphur 
Spring Valley. This mountain region is embraced in one of the divi- 
sions of the Coronado National Forest, for the higher portions are 
covered with pine and other timber. Much of the mountain land is 
also used for grazing of large numbers of cattle, sheep, and goats. 
SE NW. 
Silver Creek 
—_—— “== 
=== ZEEE 
Es 
eee 
Horizontal scale 
2 Miles 
Vertical scale 
4,000 Feet 
5 ee 
URE 43. tion of northeastern foothills of Chiri M i Portal, Ariz. <b, quartz- 
ite with sills of rhyolite (Cambrian); €a, thin-bedded limestone and shale (Abrigo); Ce, limestone 
(D i di Carbonife ): K, sandstone, limestone. d shale (C he, Lower Cretaceous); 
Ty, lava (latite, Tertiary), dip ‘i th at a }l 
ping le; gr, granite 
Six miles above Portal is Crystal Cave, in limestone (Comanche), 
which has been only partly explored, and on the west slope are many 
remarkable pinnacles and other erosion forms developed in the lavas. 
In various parts of the east front of the mountain there are remains 
of cliff dwellings, and many of these have also been found in the cliffs 
of the great succession of volcanic rocks constituting the Peloncillo 
Mois east of Rodeo and in the upper part of San Simon Valley. 
Evidently there was an aboriginal population of considerable size in 
#8 The limestones of Carboniferous | vanian age, but at its top, overlying a 
age include the Escabrosa (lower | 100-foot quartzite member, are 500 
Mississippian), overlain by about 134 | feet of limestones in which = 
feet of beds in Mien fom aban- 
dentalis, Meekella pyramidalis, Sige: 
_ anow has discovered an interesting ia guadal ; i 
aoe assemblage of upper Mississippian coloradoensis, a typical Kaibab fauna 
Log fossils; next occur about — feet of | of Permian ermian age, 
Naco- limestone, largely of Pennsyl- 
