The Grand Staircase is a geological formation spanning eons of time and is a territory of multicolored cliffs, plateaus, mesas, buttes, pinnacles, and canyons. It is divided into three distinct sections: The Grand Staircase, the Kaiparowits Plateau, and the Canyons of the Escalante. Despite their different topographies, these three sections share certain qualities: great distances, enormously difficult terrain, and a remoteness rarely equaled in the lower forty-eight states.

Human endeavors have always been limited on these lands, yet their very remoteness and isolation have attracted seekers of adventure or solitude and those who hope to understand the natural world through the Monument's wealth of scientific information.