This Sacred Navajo Monument Was Born from Ancient Volcanic Fury & Soars 1,583 Feet Above the Desert

Shiprock, New Mexico

You can spot Shiprock from 100 miles away on a clear day, its jagged peak cutting through the endless New Mexico sky.

This 1,583-foot volcanic plug isn’t just another pretty rock formation though. For the Navajo people, it’s a sacred place tied to their creation stories and ancient traditions.

Here’s the fascinating history behind one of the Southwest’s most sacred sites.

Born from an Ancient Volcano

Shiprock started forming 27 million years ago during a volcano eruption. Unlike normal volcanoes, it formed deep underground, about 2,500-3,000 feet below the surface.

Scientists call it a diatreme, a carrot-shaped pipe created when hot magma met groundwater, causing explosions that blasted through the rock above.

Over millions of years, wind and water wore away the softer rock around this hard volcanic core, leaving the tall spire we see today.

Shiprock is part of a larger group of volcanic features that spreads from New Mexico into Arizona.

Geologically Special

Shiprock is mostly made of volcanic breccia, which is rock formed from fragments that fused together during explosive eruptions.

Throughout this rock run veins of an unusual potassium-rich rock called minette. The main formation is about 1,640 feet wide at its base with many thin veins of hardened lava throughout.

The Radiating Walls of Stone

The most eye-catching features around Shiprock are the long, wall-like sheets of rock called dikes that stretch outward like spokes on a wheel.

Three main dikes extend west, northeast, and southeast from the central tower. The longest reaches five miles across the desert, standing 150 feet tall but only a few feet wide at the top.

These walls formed when liquid hot rock forced its way into cracks. When this hot rock cooled and hardened, it created these striking stone walls.

The Rock With Wings

The Navajo named this formation Tsé Bitʼaʼí, meaning “rock with wings” or “winged rock,” long before white settlers arrived.

From certain angles, it looks like a giant bird resting on the desert floor with its wings folded. The north and south peaks form the tops of these wings.

For the Navajo, this bird shape has deep meaning, connecting directly to their sacred stories and beliefs.

The Great Bird That Carried the Navajo

Navajo legend tells how Shiprock was once a giant bird that carried their ancestors from northern lands to their current home.

The story begins with the Navajo people facing danger from enemy tribes. Their medicine men prayed for help, and the ground beneath them changed into a massive bird.

This bird carried the people on its back, flying south for a day and night before landing at sunset where Shiprock now stands.

This journey brought the Navajo to the Four Corners region where New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Utah meet.

When Monster Birds Hunted Humans

Another Navajo legend describes scary Bird Monsters that once nested on Shiprock and hunted humans for food.

The suffering people received help from Changing Woman, an important Navajo deity, who sent her son Monster Slayer to fight these creatures.

Monster Slayer, one of the Hero Twins in Navajo stories, killed the two adult Bird Monsters after a tough battle.

Finding two young monsters in the nest, he spared them, turning one into an eagle and the other into an owl – two birds important in Navajo culture.

How Lightning Trapped Women and Children

A third legend explains why climbing Shiprock goes against Navajo beliefs.

The story tells how ancient Navajo once lived on top of the rock, coming down only to tend crops.

Men worked in the fields while women and children stayed safely on top. One day, while the men were working below, lightning struck and destroyed the only path connecting top to bottom.

With no way up or down, the families became permanently separated. The women and children trapped on top eventually died without food or water.

The Navajo believe their spirits still remain at Shiprock, requiring respect and distance from visitors.

The First Team to Reach the Summit

Despite its sacred status, climbers wanted to conquer Shiprock. Until 1939, no one had climbed it because of its difficult routes and crumbling rock.

In October 1939, a Sierra Club team finally made the first successful climb. The group included David Brower, Raffi Bedayn, Bestor Robinson, and John Dyer.

This historic climb was the first in America to use expansion bolts, aka metal anchors drilled into rock for safety.

Their achievement later appeared in the 1979 book “Fifty Classic Climbs of North America,” making Shiprock famous among rock climbers.

Why Climbing Became Forbidden

In March 1970, three climbers were seriously hurt on Shiprock.

This accident led the Navajo Nation to ban all climbing on tribal lands, calling the ban “absolute, final and unconditional.”

In Navajo tradition, places where people died often become forbidden areas.

The Navajo believe when someone dies, negative energy may remain as spirits called chʼį́įdii. Contact with these spirits can cause “ghost sickness” requiring healing ceremonies.

This belief, plus the legends of those who died on Shiprock, makes climbing deeply disrespectful to Navajo traditions.

European Settlers Name the Formation

In 1860, Captain J.F. McComb of the U.S. Geological Survey named the formation “The Needle” because of its pointed top.

By the 1870s, maps called it “Ship Rock” because from certain angles, it looks like an old sailing ship with its sails up.

This English name ignored the Navajo understanding of the formation as a bird, showing how differently the settlers viewed the natural world.

The nearby town later took the name Shiprock too, growing from a trading post after the railroad came through.

Visiting Shiprock

Shiprock sits on Navajo Nation land in northwestern New Mexico. You can only view it from paved roads – Indian Service Route 13 and U.S. Highway 491 offer the best viewing spots. 

The Navajo Nation strictly prohibits approaching, hiking, climbing, or driving on dirt roads near Shiprock. 

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