Painted Desert

When I was a kid, Granny Hunt brought me a paperweight that had a sand sculpture in it from the Painted Desert (I think she traveled west with Uncle Carl). When I realized we were near the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest National Park, we decided to take a day to visit them. It was a very windy day, but beautiful vistas and interesting things about which to learn!

North of I-40 is the "red" section of the painted desert. Today, the sky was full of fluffy clouds and their shadows on the ground made for a continuously changing view that was beautiful!

The park road wound around and crossed I-40 to the south. It was pretty amazing how distinctly different the land was south of that man-made boundary.

This was on the Blue Mesa loop - from the top - I could see small specks that were moving way, way down there - I figured they were on some *other* trail... no... they weren't...

After we got down into the valley (badlands) we were surrounded by beautiful scenes.

Over to the right center edge of this picture, you can see another couple who was also walking the trail (with their dog) - to give you an idea of how magnificent it was! You may also notice some shadows down along the ground - those are pieces of petrified wood that were scattered around on the ground in this area.

And there's my honey!!!