In addition to the plant life, we saw amazing geological formations in this extremely active tectonic zone. Mild earthquakes are almost a daily event, most too gentle to notice without a seismograph.
A gentle slope leads to a cliff that drops hundreds of feet into badlands where nothing grows.
In a deep canyon large granite river cobbles deposited 15 feet above the floor show the power of flash floods. The granite has been eroded out of mountains 15 miles away, and brought down the sandstone canyon by the rushing water.
An "anticline" is a layer of strata twisted by the tectonic forces into a knot.