Canyonlands National Park is a U.S. National Park located in southeastern Utah near the city of Moab. The park preserves a colorful landscape eroded into countless canyons, mesas and buttes by the Colorado River, the Green River, and their respective tributaries. The rivers divide the park into four districts: the Island in the Sky, the Needles, the Maze and the rivers themselves. While these areas share a primitive desert atmosphere, each retains its own character. The park covers 527.5 square miles. Canyons are carved into the Colorado Plateau by the Colorado River and Green River.

This area was once home of the Ancestral Puebloans, of which many traces can be found. They left traces in the form of petroglyphs, most notably on the so-called Newspaper Rock near the Visitor Center at the entrance of the Needles district.