We headed
out early this morning for our second exploration of the Petrified Forest
National Park and the Painted Desert. As
I was reviewing information on the park last night I found out that this
Saturday and Sunday are two of the “fee free” days for all national parks. Next weekend will also be fee free, so get
out and take advantage of a great bargain.
The park is about 20 miles from where we are staying until Sunday.
Before we
got into the actual park we had to check out a museum and souvenir shop. If you are in the market for a one-of-a-kind
coffee table, you might be interested in this one made of a slab of polished
petrified wood. It will only set you
back $12,500. Since petrified wood
weighs in at about 200 pounds per cubic foot you might have to reinforce the
floor.
If you are
interested in something smaller this polished piece is only $4,500. These are undoubtedly beautiful, but I wonder
how many of them actually sell.
The 28-mile
road through the park offers several areas with pull offs for photo
opportunities. Two visitor centers and
museums are also in the park offering lots of information. We stopped at the museum in the Rainbow
Forest area.
This area along
with several of the other areas have well maintained trails where you can get a
little closer to the petrified wood. The
wind today was brutal so I was surprised that most of the pictures I took
turned out, it was hard to hold the camera steady.
Small
colorful wildflowers are scattered among the petrified logs.
The logs
near the Rainbow Forest area are the longest in the park.
I’m just
amazed by the brilliant colors. Today is
a really sunny day, I’m sure the colors all look different on an overcast day.
Not many
cacti are in this area, this one was showing off some beautiful flowers.
I wonder how
many more years this formation will stand.
From this side it looks pretty sturdy.
I shot this
one looking back at the formation, it looks pretty tenuous here.
The Crystal
Forest area was once a part of a tropical forest. 217 million years ago this whole area was
located near the equator. It was part of
a supercontinent which broke apart and the northern part of that supercontinent
moved north becoming North America, this area became Arizona.
The 110 foot
Agate Bridge is off limits now because the gully underneath it is gradually
eroding and the bridge will eventually fall into the gully. The concrete span underneath the log was a
1917 attempt to prolong the life of the bridge.
After this tree died it was washed into a river and quickly buried in
the river sediment preventing decay.
Volcanic ash dissolved in groundwater provided silica which reacted with
the log and turned it into quartz. Over
the years water eroded the area and the log was unearthed once again. This is the same process that all of the
trees went through that are now petrified.
There is our
Jeep looking through one of the buildings that is undergoing reconstruction.
The Blue
Mesa area is one of my favorites even though blue isn’t usually my favorite
color. See the petrified logs sitting on
top of one of the formations in the center?
Closer look
at the logs.
More shots
of the beautiful Blue Mesa area.
This area is
call the Tee Pees. Red is prevalent here.
The road
from the Petrified Forest continues on for 6 miles into the Painted
Dessert. Under today’s conditions red
was the color of most of the area. I
told Greg if we lived in this area I would be out here several times during the
year to see how the colors changed – sunset, sunrise, winter, overcast
skies. I could just here him thinking I
would be coming by myself if I wanted to come back that many times.
Our wildlife
picture of the day – one lonely grasshopper.
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