I am taking the family on a fly-drive trip to the States. We fly into Denver and plan to drive into the Rockies. Can you tell where I can get some information on the Devil’s Tower, the mountain used in Close Encounters of the Third Kind I think? Ian Hunter, Liverpool

Sunday Times travel expert Richard Green responds: Yes it was the Devil’s Tower that featured in Spielberg’s 1977 film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, as the alien landing pad. It is little wonder that it was chosen, being on of the oddest natural features in the USA.

It rises 1,267 feet almost sheer-sided above the plain and is a volcanic plug - the hardened magma left from the vent of a long since eroded volcano. It is a sacred site for many Native Americans, several tribes of whom refer to it as Bears Lodge.

The scrape lines that Richard Dreyfuss was trying to recreate with mashed potato in the film, in Native American belief, are the marks left by wild bear chasing six Sioux girls. The Great Spirit saw them being chased and raised the ground on which they stood to protect them.

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It was also the fist national monument in the USA, proclaimed as such by Theodore Roosevelt in 1906.

If you do decide to make the 400-mile drive due north from Denver, the place to start is the Visitor Center (open mid-spring through to the end of Autumn). There is lots of good information of the geology and the mythology, plus maps of the hiking trails. The best of which is the 1.3-mile long Tower Trail that circles the monument. It is paved, and very popular in the summer.

You’d be in for a big surprise if you happened to be at the Tower next year during the week commencing August 9. The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally takes place at Sturgis South Dakota annually, and while it is almost 80 miles from the Tower, thousands of bikers make the trip up, especially in the middle of the Raleigh, on the Wednesday.

See www.nps.gov/deto (A 1-7 day vehicle pass is $10 (£6.30) for a car and passengers) for information on the monument, or for tourist information on the state of Wyoming, visit www.wyomingtourism.org.

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