Such a fine sight to see . . .

 

November 13th - our 41st wedding anniversary and we celebrated by going on an excellent field trip in northern Arizona with our friends Ruth and Wayne.   In case you were wondering  - yes, I was 10 years old when we got married. :)
 The first stop was the Petrified Forest National Park. It is a huge park which includes desert shrub as well as highly eroded and colorful badlands.  This park is about 26 miles east of Holbrook.  It parallels historic U.S. Route 66 so we saw a lot of old buildings and items from a previous era along the way.
It is hard to believe that dinosaurs and huge trees were once alive on what is now desert.  It was odd to see the huge petrified  trees everywhere.

Close up of the pretty rock that was once a giant tree.  My dad took us kids out rock hunting on many an occasion and instilled in us all a real interest in rocks.  I remember finding a small piece of petrified wood being a big deal.  These were literally a "big" deal.
The northern part of this park extends into the Painted Desert.

These are called the Tepees.   Unfortunately the day was overcast and the pictures not nearly as amazing as they could have been.

The desert here is composed of stratified layers of erodible siltstone, mudstone and shale.   The layers of rock contain iron and manganese which provide the various colors.

 On top of the front ridge you will see  huge petrified log pieces. The smaller pieces of petrified wood have fallen down the sides of the sandstone.

 Much of the area is protected but there are hiking trails available, we were able to drive along the rim and stop off at many of the look outs along the way.  It was very well set up.

                                               some of the old stuff along Route 66  (ha)

 Winslow Arizona is a pretty tired little town but we did enjoy lunch and of course" Standing on the corner"

 It was getting late afternoon by the time we left Winslow so we drove about an hour to our hotel which was close to  Flagstaff.  It was a beautiful hotel with huge room and a bathroom nearly as big as my whole house! 
The next morning we headed to the Meteor Crater   This roadrunner was busy admiring himself in the reflection of the window at the visitor center there.

 The meteor crater, they say, is the best preserved and first proven meteorite impact site on earth.  We stopped and watched the short video showing how they feel the meteor ended its 500 million year long race through space headed toward earth.  It travelled approximately 26,000 miles per hour.  The crater is nearly a mile across and more than 550 feet deep.  The terrain resembles that of the moon so it is a training site for the Apollo astronauts.

I could not get far enough away to get a shot of the whole crater but it is mind boggling.  They said 20 football fields could fit on the floor of the crater

              This is a piece of the meteorite they had on display.  It looks like a giant chunk of metal.

After our tour of the Meteor Crater we headed north of Flagstaff to the Sunset Crater Volcano
As soon as we got a little higher in elevation and saw the trees I realized how much I miss the forest.  So beautiful to see the huge pine trees as well as stellars jays and some juncos.

               We were able to walk right on the lava field and it was black as far as the eye could see.

 The volcano erupted in 1085 which of course changed the landscape and its inhabitants.  There are interesting plants and trees that have learned to grow in the new environment that are not seen other places in Arizona.  There were a lot of beautiful Two Needle  Pinyon Pines and cedar trees.

                                                                      even some Aspen

      I think you can see the actual crater from the other side of the volcano.  Even the sand was black.

The next stop was Wapatki National Monument where we looked at the remains of the many settlement sites throughout the monument.  They were build by the ancient Pueblo peoples and have been standing for more than 900 years

 The dwelling's walls were constructed from thin, flat blocks of the sandstone and held together with mortar. The largest settlement in the monument is the Wapatki Ruin. With over 100 rooms, this is the tallest and largest of the time period. 

The ruins in all of these photos is called the Wukoki complex.  It is believed to be built by the ancestors of today's Hopi Tribe.  2 or 3 families lived in this complex.

We were able to climb up and into the rooms and go through doorways and look out the windows.

It was a jam packed 2 days and a really good way to see a lot of interesting things in a relatively short time.