Cathedral Rock
— — the red sandstone the creek keeps a picture of.
Not only on a wall.
“A short, steep sandstone formation in red Sedona country, about three miles south of town above Oak Creek. From Red Rock Crossing on the west side, the towers double in the still water of the creek. The trail to the saddle is half a mile of scrambling, climbing six hundred feet through cross-bedded Schnebly Hill sandstone. At sunset the rock turns the colour of a banked fire.
Cathedral Rock, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Cathedral Rock rises 4,921 feet above Oak Creek in the red rock country southwest of Sedona, Arizona, within the Coconino National Forest. The formation is a remnant of Schnebly Hill Sandstone — Permian-age cross-bedded dune deposits laid down roughly 270 million years ago. From Red Rock Crossing on the west side, the towers reflect in the shallows of Oak Creek, producing one of the most photographed views in the American Southwest. The Cathedral Rock Trail climbs about 600 feet over half a mile to the saddle between the towers.
Sedona's red comes from iron oxide bound into the sandstone, and Cathedral Rock catches that colour at both ends of the day. Sunrise hits the eastern faces first; sunset, the side seen from Red Rock Crossing. Forty minutes before dark the towers shift from rust to a deeper plum, then briefly to a colour photographers call burning. The San Francisco Peaks, fifty miles north, occasionally throw their shadow across the Verde Valley behind the formation. After monsoon afternoons the wet rock reads almost black against the cloud line.
Two trailheads access Cathedral Rock. The Back o' Beyond trailhead on the east lies a mile off State Route 179 and gives the direct climb to the saddle. The Red Rock Crossing approach on the west, through Crescent Moon Picnic Site, gives the reflected view and an easy walk along Oak Creek. A Red Rock Pass or America the Beautiful pass covers parking at both. The east-side lot fills by mid-morning year-round; rangers recommend arriving at sunrise or after 4 p.m.