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   The Little Cottonwood Canyon holds high granite cliffs. It is strewn with quartz monzonite outcroppings, producing smooth steep faces over several hundred feet high. The trees and scrub oaks finds cracks and take a foothold in the rock surface.
   The famous Salt Lake Mormon Temple was built using quartz monzonite and granite from this canyon. The Mormon pioneers hauled great stones down the canyon by oxen and wagon to build the temple. The Salt Lake Temple is the largest and best-known temple of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The LDS Church’s Granite Mountain vault is located in Little Cottonwood Canyon.
   Do not expect to go and visit the vault. The land on the north side, known as the "Church Buttress", which is above the vault and the Black Peeler Buttress are private land.

   Rock climbers enjoy the 20-odd named buttresses and gullies available for climbing. You need to park alongside the road and then hike up through scrub oak, and fields of enormous boulders.
   As you enjoy your climbing up keep a watch out for deer, moose and the Mountain goats (Oreamnos americanus), also known as the Rocky Mountain Goat found only in North America.This awesome goat a true goat it is not - it is a close relative of antelopes and cattle.

Quartz monzonite porphyry is often confused with granite, because of its coloring. The mass of granite is 20% quartz, quartz monzonite is only 5-20% quartz.