[1] It is written as a series of vignettes about Abbey's experiences in the Colorado Plateau region of the desert Southwestern United States, ranging from vivid descriptions of the fauna, flora, geology, and human inhabitants of the area, to firsthand accounts of wilderness exploration and river running, to a polemic against development and excessive tourism in the national parks, to stories of the author's work with a search and rescue team to pull a human corpse out of the desert.

Abbey held the position from April to September each year, during which time he maintained trails, greeted visitors, and collected campground fees.

[2] During his stay at Arches, Abbey accumulated a large volume of notes and sketches which later formed the basis of his first non-fiction work, Desert Solitaire.

[6] Cliffrose and Bayonets and Serpents of Paradise focus on Abbey's descriptions of the fauna and flora of the Arches area, respectively, and his observations of the already deteriorating balance of biodiversity in the desert due to the pressures of human settlement in the region.

Abbey provides detailed inventories and observations of the life of desert plants, and their unique adaptations to their harsh surroundings, including the cliffrose, juniper, pinyon pine, and sand sage.

[9] The Heat of Noon: Rock and Tree and Cloud describes the intensity of the summer months in the park, and the various ways in which animals and humans have tried to survive and adapt in those conditions.

Abbey contrasts the difficult lives of the many who unsuccessfully sought their fortune in the desert whilst others left millionaires from lucky strikes, and the legacy of government policy and human greed that can be seen in the modern landscape of mines and shafts, roads and towns.

Abbey also comments on some of the particular cultural artifacts of the region, such as the Basque population, the Mormons, and the archaeological remains of the Ancient Puebloan peoples in cliff dwellings, stone petroglyphs, and pictographs.

[12] Several chapters center around Abbey's expeditions beyond the park, either accompanied or alone, and often serve as opportunities for rich descriptions of the surrounding environments and further observations about the natural and human world.

Specifically, his search for a wild horse in the canyons (The Moon-Eyed Horse), his camping around the Havasupai tribal lands and his temporary entrapment on a cliff face there (Havasu), the discovery of a dead tourist at an isolated area of what is now Canyonlands National Park (The Dead Man at Grandview Point), his attempt to navigate the Maza area of the Canyonlands National Park (Terra Incognita: Into the Maze), and his ascent of Mount Tukuhnikivats (Tukuhnikivats, the Island in the Desert) are recounted.

[13] Down the River, the longest chapter of the book, recalls a journey by boat down Glen Canyon undertaken by Abbey and an associate, in part inspired by John Wesley Powell's original voyage of discovery in 1869.

[14] Finally, several chapters are devoted largely to Abbey's reflections on the damaging impact of humans on the everyday life, nature, and culture of the region.

[15] In Episodes and Visions, Abbey meditates on religion, philosophy, and literature and their intersections with desert life, as well as collects various thoughts on the tension between culture and civilization, espousing many tenets in support of environmentalism.

He introduces the desert as "the flaming globe, blazing on the pinnacles and minarets and balanced rocks"[18] and describes his initial reaction to his newfound environment and its challenges.

[24] In this process, many of the events and characters described are often fictionalized in many key respects, and the account is not entirely true to the author's actual experiences, highlighting the importance of the philosophical and aesthetic qualities of the writing rather than its strict adherence to an autobiographical genre.

I am here not only to escape for a while the clamor and filth and confusion of the cultural apparatus but also to confront, immediately and directly if it's possible, the bare bones of existence, elemental and fundamental, the bedrock which sustains us.

This is made apparent with quotes such as: "Yet history demonstrates that personal liberty is a rare and precious thing, that all societies tend toward the absolute until an attack from without or collapse from within breaks up the social machine and makes freedom and innovation again possible.

I am thinking, what incredible shit we put up with most of our lives – the domestic routine (same old wife every night), the stupid and useless degrading jobs, the insufferable arrogance of elected officials, the crafty cheating and the slimy advertising of the business men, the tedious wars in which we kill our buddies instead of our real enemies back in the capital, the foul diseased and hideous cities and towns we live in, the constant petty tyranny of automatic washers and automobiles and TV machines and telephone!

If industrial man continues to multiply its numbers and expand his operations he will succeed in his apparent intention, to seal himself off from the natural and isolate himself within a synthetic prison of his own making.

[34] That emptiness is one of the defining aspects of the desert wildness and for Abbey one of its greatest assets – and one which humans have disturbed and harmed by their own presence: I am almost prepared to believe that this sweet virginal primitive land would be grateful for my departure and the absence of the tourist, will breathe metaphorically a collective sigh of relief – like a whisper of wind – when we are all and finally gone and the place and its creations can return to their ancient procedures unobserved and undisturbed by the busy, anxious, brooding consciousness of man.

Too much for some, who have given up the struggle on the highways, in exchange for an entirely different kind of vacation – out in the open, on their own feet, following the quiet trail through forests and mountains, bedding down in the evening under the stars, when and where they feel like it, at a time where the Industrial Tourists are still hunting for a place to park their automobiles.

He was in favor of returning to nature and gaining the freedom that was lost with the inventions that take us places in this day and age: A man could be a lover and defender of the wilderness without ever in his lifetime leaving the boundaries of asphalt, power lines, and right-angled surfaces.

When Abbey is lounging in his chair in 110-degree heat at Arches and observes that the mountains are snow-capped and crystal clear, it shows what nature provides: one extreme is able to counter another.

It is where we came from, and something we still recognize as our starting point: Standing there, gaping at this monstrous and inhuman spectacle of rock and cloud and sky and space, I feel a ridiculous greed and possessiveness come over me.