| The EDGE Day 5, Petrified Forest & Painted Desert |
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| After leaving Gallup, our next destination was the Painted Desert & Petrified Forest National Park. As you can see in this picture of the Painted Desert, the smoke from the Arizona fires hadn't yet impacted the view, however that would change as the day wore on. |
| The first stops we made at the Painted Desert were at the first couple of lookouts. I dropped the EDGE-lings off at the first lookout and then drove the motorhome to the next lookout, which was not very far away, to meet them after a brief hike. |
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| After leaving the Painted Desert, we went south to the Petrified Forest. Once again the sites were spectacular, however we were now in the direct path of the smoke from the Arizona fires. The day was very gray, so through the magic of digital photography, I was able to enhance these photos to try to get a bit more color and contrast. |
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| This stop was the Blue Mesa in the Petrified Forest. This location had a hiking trail for us to go on. I think by this time in the trip the kids were getting a bit tired of hiking, but they were real troopers and didn't complain (too much). The first part of this trail was a bit steep, but leveled out when we got to the bottom. |
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| This trail was a loop. Along the way we say a small sampling of petrified wood. There was much more to come, as we got further into the park. |
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| Here we see a sample of a petrified log. Petrified wood was formed by the following process. After the trees fell, swollen trees that were abundant in this area washed them away. They were then covered by silt, mud and volcanic ash. This cut off the oxygen supply, which slowed the decaying process. Gradually silica-bearing ground waters seeped through the logs and slowly replaced the wood with silica deposits. As the process continued, the silica crystallized into quartz, and the logs were preserved as petrified wood. |
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| This area of the Petrified Forest is called the 'Crystal Forest'. Once again this was a short hike that was a loop. We were getting to see more and more example of complete logs. It was very interesting, however the biggest logs were yet to come. |
| This is another photo of the Crystal Forest area. The smoke was getting more intense as we traveled further south. |
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| Here is a fabulous sample of the colors that are contained within the petrified wood. I am sure they would have even been brighter had there been no smoke blocking the sun. |
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| We finally arrived at the southern entrance to the park, where the largest of the petrified logs are. This area is aptly called 'Giant Logs'. |
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| Karen & Lynn just had to have their picture taken together at this large piece of petrified wood. Don't they look cute together? |
| Petrified wood is not the only thing to be found in the Petrified Forest. On the way back up north through the park we stopped at a place called 'Newspaper Rock'. There were huge boulders covered with petroglyphs. The arrow points out some of them. They are a bit hard to distinguish in the picture, as we could not get close to the rock. This photo was taken from an overlook. |
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| After leaving the Petrified Forest & the Painted Desert, off we went to Flagstaff. We stayed at another KOA campground there, but this was among the trees. There was not much room to maneuver around with the big RV we had. This location offered us a cooler night for sleeping. This picture was taken early in the morning where you can see Grandpa getting breakfast ready for all the EDGE-lings. |