Once again we had an early morning start, because we had a big day ahead of us. In order to stick to schedule, I had us planned to do a long drove from Southwest Colorado (Durango), through various points, and finally to the Petrified Forest National Park as our last stop.
The first stop was Mesa Verde National Park, which featured not only beautiful landscape, but some very old Indian ruins from about 1400AD! Our intentions were to get to the end of the park, and have time to explore the famed indian castle built into the cliffs. However (Unfortunately) we were only able to get to the top of the entrance and see the over look of the whole park. The park was about 30 miles southwest of Durango and it looks as though it would be great to explore if you were into American history and Indians, however we only had time to take a picture and move on.
Our next stop on the way was the Four Corners Monument. This is where the four states of Utah, Arizona, Colorado and New Mexico touch corners, and one can put their finger on all four states! Now we understand someone has to pay for the memorial but unfortunately you do have to pay five dollars a person to go see it, because our National Park Pass was not valid on land owned by the Navajo Indians. I suppose it’s worth a picture to say you were there. It takes about 30 minutes on a regular day of tourists to get through the line of people picture taking.
We left this area around 11am and headed Southwest, and from then it became a drastically different landscape. This is because we went from mountain ranges straight into the desert. It was quite the drastic shift of terrain.
Next up for the day was the amazing (albeit lesser known) Canyon De Chelly National Monument. It’s essentially a canyon that has sheer rock walls of 600 feet from top to bottom. This alone is impressive, but when you stand at the overlook and see how the Indians had carved entire communities out of the rock walls, it makes for an impressive site from a distance. There are various overlooks and information points to see. It’s very similar to the Colorado National Monument in size and shape. Nonetheless it was definitely a surprise and a good thing to add to the trip, as this is an often overlooked part of the landscape of an American road trip itinerary. One of the primary features of Canyon de Chelly, is the Spider Rock Pulpit. This is viewed at the far overlook of the park, and is a turret style monolith, which seems to come directly out of the valley floor!
Now that it was mid day, and we were making good time….we still had to get south to Arizona Petrified Forest. At the rate we’re going it would’ve put us there by about 5pm. We were able to make it by 4:55 and grab a pamphlet at the visitors center, as we always do for each National Park. When entering you will see a fuel station….definitely take advantage of this as once you start the drive through the park it’s either you must turn around or must keep going for 40 miles before any gas station. The park features petrified trees from millions of years of sun exposure. At first it doesn’t seem like much but when you go around the corner there’s a hotel that is on the original route 66 and is a historic site with incredible indian architecture. Behind the hotel, however, is the gorgeous overlook of thousands of dunes and petrified dwellings. It is absolutely jaw-dropping during sunset.
This is just the beginning of something I didn’t expect to enjoy that much during this trip. The park itself features large amounts of petrified wood, which is essentially broken branches of trees that have turned to stone over millions of years of intense heat from the sun. The wood (Stone) breaks off like a pieces of chocolate or chalk into similar shapes and sizes similiar to a tree trunk. Once you start driving through the park you can see many petrified dunes but further along you can see an entire section of the park called the Crystal Trail for us to hike. This is a small hike (1/4 mile) but worth the time as it gives you a great perspective of the rocky wood, and an opportunity to see it upfront and first hand.
This is where many people have tried to collect small broken rocks (Petrified wood) but you’re not allowed to. This is definitely the best walk for someone on a time restraint within the park, as it was only a quarter-mile long loop and featured some of the best petrified wood in the whole park. There are various overlooks and various pull offs throughout the park but the last attraction is one of the best as it shows the largest petrified tree trunk in the world. It’s amazing to see some of these glossed petrified trunks (which sell for tens of thousands of dollars) in front of you on the ground, laying there with no concern of human interference.
It was sunset now, and we were scrambling to find a campsite as it was getting dark and we still had no site picked for our tent. Fortunately, at the end of the road we saw a big sign that said ‘free camping’. ‘Surely they couldn’t be free’ we thought, but sure enough it was just a plot of land where you’re allowed to put campers, and tents down for the night. There were no hook ups but it’s a great (relatively) secret area that many people don’t ever find, and it’s really only to camp ona nightly basis. This quick find of a campsite gave us a little bit of time for dinner, which helped as it was getting dark and we didn’t have time to cook on the propane stove. We headed into the town of Holbrook, which was 20 miles down the road from where we were camping.
The town was definitely run down, but overall safe. We went to the only visibly open restaurant in the city at a hotel at the El Rancho Restaurant and Motel. Pretty decent Mexican food but we ordered way too much. Nonetheless it was a great budget meal. This brings us to the end of an incredible day, and having seen so many amazing sites, we decided to head back to the tent and enjoy a great night sleep under the incredible views of nighttime stars. This was probably the furthest from civilization we’ve ever been, and though it was slightly scary, it was very satisfying knowing we were living our dream. And just like usual, we were ready to sleep for the next early morning.
June 13 Expenses –
8.50 Burger king
21.03 gas and car wash
10 four corners
8.63 snack
21.66 gas
29.30 dinner
8 snack
Total – 107.12
MILES DRIVEN – 409 Miles