Symmetry protected topological phases are a new class of distinct symmetric phases in the

presence of a protecting symmetry. An early example of a nontrivial symmetry protected

topological state is the ground state of the spin-1 Heisenberg antiferromagnet--the so-called

Haldane phase. The Haldane phase is distinct from the symmetric product state of zero spin

projection along the z-axis |D\rangle=\Prod_i |0\rangle_i that is adiabatically connected to the

so-called large-D phase. In this work, we explore the imaginary-time evolution of the state

|D\rangle after a quantum quench into the Haldane phase and present details of a quantum

Monte Carlo method that can easily be extended to studies in higher dimensions.