Travel Weary....."and we've only just begun to drive". (Homage to The Carpenters)
We left Flagstaff, Arizona this morning heading east on Interstate 40.....destination - Albuquerque!
Blue Skies and Flat Land......works for me!
The Skies turned stormy.....but, it didn't last long
Huge Power Plant in the middle of nowhere......
We decided to check out The Petrified National Forest, since Interstate 40 drove right through it.
We turned into the town of Holbrook, Arizona. Holbrook is located right on Historic Route 66.
We passed a historic landmark....The Tepee Hotel that was featured in Disney's Animated Feature
"Cars".
They also had vintage cars and trucks parked outside the motel tepees.
One of the vintage trucks was 'Mater' from "Cars".......with a new paint job!
The highway to The Petrified Wood Forest was long and no traffic or homes or barns.....
But, we did follow a truck for a short distance with a dog catching the breeze.
Petrified Forest National Park
Pictures of Petrified Logs
Notice the Rainbow color of the buried log.....red and yellow are more popular colors of the wood as opposed to green and blue.
Petrified Wood on a "mountain"
Scattered Logs
Logs on the hillside
Huge piece of petrified wood
This Historic Marker and rusty old car and the electrical poles that followed Route 66 were at the entrance of the Painted Desert.
Interstate 40 is on the horizon. The "older" poles originally lined Route 66
The Petrified Forest highway evolves into the highway for the Painted Desert
We got back on the Interstate.
When I was a young girl, our family went to the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest and I recall driving through the "forest" just as we did today. It seemed to me that there were a lot more pieces of the logs though the forest than there was today? You were warned by signs not to take any wood...that it was available for purchase at the rock shop. However, today, we saw only one sign prohibiting the taking of wood pieces......
The Petrified Forest wood comes from tall conifers. The trees grew more than 200 million years ago along waterways, where flooding caused uprooted trees. The minerals from the water over time caused the mineralization of the trees and hardened them.
Tomorrow, Monday, September 29, 2014, our destination is Amarillo, Texas.
We are blest to live in the United States of America!
Saw a new crescent moon in a New Mexico Sky....did you?
Journey Mercies.....
No comments:
Post a Comment