LeChee Rock is a sandstone feature located south of

Lake Powell Lake Powell is a reservoir on the Colorado River in Utah and Arizona, United States. It is a major vacation destination visited by approximately two million people every year. It holds of water when full, second in the United States to only the ...

, in

Coconino County Coconino County is a County (United States), county in the North Central Arizona, North-Central part of the U.S. state of Arizona. Its population was 145,101 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. The county seat is Flagstaff, Arizon ...

of northern

Arizona Arizona is a U.S. state, state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States, sharing the Four Corners region of the western United States with Colorado, New Mexico, and Utah. It also borders Nevada to the nort ...

. It is situated east-southeast of the town of

Page Page most commonly refers to: * Page (paper), one side of a leaf of paper, as in a book Page, PAGE, pages, or paging may also refer to: Roles * Page (assistance occupation), a professional occupation * Page (servant), traditionally a young m ...

, east of the community of LeChee, and south of Tower Butte, on

Navajo Nation The Navajo Nation (), also known as Navajoland, is an Indian reservation of Navajo people in the United States. It occupies portions of northeastern Arizona, northwestern New Mexico, and southeastern Utah. The seat of government is located in ...

land, where it towers over above the surrounding terrain as a landmark of the area. It can be seen from nearby

Arizona State Route 98 State Route 98 (SR 98) is a state highway in Coconino County in the U.S. state of Arizona. Route description SR 98 begins at an intersection with US 89 just south of the Glen Canyon Dam along the Colorado River. It runs along the southern po ...

, or from as far away as

Alstrom Point Alstrom Point is a 4,685-foot (1,428 meter) elevation landmark located in Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, in Kane County of southern Utah. It is situated northeast of the town of Page. This iconic landmark of the Lake Powell area is a ca ...

. LeChee (''Łichíí'') in

Navajo language Navajo or Navaho ( ; Navajo: or ) is a Southern Athabaskan languages, Southern Athabaskan language of the Na-Dene languages, Na-Dené family, through which it is related to languages spoken across the western areas of North America. Navajo i ...

means red, referring to burgundy-colored leaves of a medicinal plant. The spelling for this geographical feature's name was officially adopted in 2004 by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, prior to that it was officially Leche-e Rock.

Geology

LeChee Rock is located in the southern edge of the

Great Basin Desert The Great Basin Desert is part of the Great Basin between the Sierra Nevada and the Wasatch Range in the western United States. The desert is a geographical region that largely overlaps the Great Basin shrub steppe defined by the World Wildlife ...

on the

Colorado Plateau The Colorado Plateau is a physiographic and desert region of the Intermontane Plateaus, roughly centered on the Four Corners region of the Southwestern United States. This plateau covers an area of 336,700 km2 (130,000 mi2) within w ...

. It is composed of Romana Sandstone overlaying the Escalante Member of

Entrada Sandstone The Entrada Sandstone is a formation (geology), formation in the San Rafael Group found in the U.S. states of Wyoming, Colorado, northwest New Mexico, northeast Arizona, and southeast Utah. Part of the Colorado Plateau, this formation was deposi ...

capped In sport, a cap is a player's appearance in a game at international level. The term dates from the practice in the United Kingdom of awarding a cap to every player in an international match of rugby football and association football. In the e ...

by the Salt Wash Member of the

Morrison Formation The Morrison Formation is a distinctive sequence of Upper Jurassic sedimentary rock found in the western United States which has been the most fertile source of dinosaur fossils in North America. It is composed of mudstone, sandstone, siltston ...

. Beneath the sandstone, along the base of this feature, is reddish

Carmel Formation The Carmel Formation is a geologic formation in the San Rafael Group that is spread across the U.S. states of Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, north east Arizona and New Mexico. Part of the Colorado Plateau, this formation was laid down in the Middle Ju ...

which gives this feature its name. All the strata are

Jurassic The Jurassic ( ) is a Geological period, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system that spanned from the end of the Triassic Period million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period, approximately 143.1 Mya. ...

in age. Precipitation runoff from this feature drains to Navajo and

Antelope Canyon Navajo Upper Antelope Canyon is a slot canyon in the American Southwest, on Navajo land east of Lechee, Arizona. It includes six separate, scenic slot canyon sections on the Navajo Reservation, referred to as Upper Antelope Canyon (or The Crac ...

s, then Lake Powell, all part of the

Colorado River The Colorado River () is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and in northern Mexico. The river, the List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem), 5th longest in the United St ...

drainage basin A drainage basin is an area of land in which all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...

Gallery

File:Leche-e Rock, AZ.jpg, West aspect File:Leche-e Rock.jpg, Northwest aspect File:View of LeChee Rock on SR 98 Arizona.jpg File:LeChee Rock on Arizona State Route 98.jpg, South aspect from Highway 98 File:LeChee Rock Highway 98.jpg, Northwest aspect from Highway 98 File:LeChee Rock.tiff

Climate

According to the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...

system, LeChee Rock is located in an

arid climate The desert climate or arid climate (in the Köppen climate classification ''BWh'' and ''BWk'') is a dry climate sub-type in which there is a severe excess of evaporation over precipitation. The typically bald, rocky, or sandy surfaces in desert ...

zone with hot, very dry summers, and chilly winters with very little snow. Spring and fall are the most favorable seasons to visit.

References

External links

{{commons category, LeChee Rock * Weather forecast
National Weather Service

LeChee Rock pronunciation
Colorado Plateau Landforms of Coconino County, Arizona Geography of the Navajo Nation One-thousanders of the United States Rock formations of Arizona

Geology

Gallery

Climate

See also

References

External links