Thursday May 1, '14

I tried to post this morning but the wind was so gusty that I wrote a paragraph that I couldn't save on Blogger.  So I figured I'd post from Flagstaff, but didn't find a Starbucks and my Jetpack reception wasn't better there than it is here, back at Meteor Crater RV.  Besides, I got seduced by Mama Burger--but we'll get to that.

I still have no pictures of Meteor Crater from my earlier visit.  So here's my plan:  I'm getting Myrtle ready to hit the road southbound in the morning,  I'll go up to the Meteor Crater first thing, with my Nikon camera.  It is supposed to be the least windy of several weeks past and future in the morning, and I wanted to walk all around the rim.  I did a guide-lead walk of about 1/4 of the rim Monday, and learned a lot.  But you have to stay with the group all of the way back.

The pictures that I have for you today are from my Tuesday (April 29) trip east to Petrified Forest National Park.  This used to be two parks, PF and Painted Desert, with a common boundary.   Combining them makes geologic sense, because the petrified logs and the colorful sedimentary layers extend throughout the park--along with some great plant, animal, and marine fossils!

The park is about an hour east of here, beyond Holbrook.  I entered at the southern gate and went to that visitor's center first (and a thank you again to the national parks for the senior pass to get in free).

The center had some great fossil displays inside, and the Giant Logs walk outside. These first three are the indoor exhibits.  The dinosaur can stand directly over his legs (hips have a ball socket) but the croc  can't.  But the croc ancestor has better plating on his back!

Flying reptile with a one-fingerbone-wing.

Dinosaur in back, croc ancestor in front.

15 foot long croc ancestor has great protective plating.

The next two are outdoor from the Giant Log Walk.

This log's base is about 20 feet across.

This coloration is typical of the more southern area of the park.

You can see the painted layers of sediment, but the colors just don't show--gray-blue, gray-lavendar, grey white, grey-beige.  The sedimentary stone is all Chinle Formation, and is from the Triassic.  Colors very from spot to spot because the layers are very localized.

The drive through the park is about 35 miles, with lots of pull-outs or branches of a few miles to show you particular versions of logs or colors of sediment.  We had jasper logs and crystal logs, and one is called the Agate Bridge--a petrified log bridge across a deep narrow wash (water runs intermittently). the log is supported with concrete because it was discovered in the 20s or 30s and enthusiasts in the 40s were worried that the soil was eroding and the bridge would fall.  Officials say now that they let nature   take it's course, so it would have fallen with today's policy.

More than three-quarters of the way north through the park is the remains of a village dating back maybe 800 years.  The remains of the buildings--set around a central courtyard--are on a bluff.  They farmed below on the valley floor to take advantage of the rainy season's flooding.  You can see one room excavated. The area has not been completely excavated, and much of what has been was covered back up to preserve it.

The walls were probably above ground when they were built.

The next pictures are for those of us who go a bit crazy over ancient solar calendars.  This is on the edge of the bluff, only a few hundred yards from the village.

The small pix across the bottom show what happens over several hours.

The marker above shows how it works--on the summer solstice the sun shines through a crack in rock and lights up the carved spiral in the dark desert-varnished boulder.

The spiral is on the browner side to the left, about the center of the picture.

This is the crack that the sun shines through on the solstice.  You can see the spiral if you squint!

The last six miles on the north end of the park's road is into strata where the layers of sediment have a lot of reds to them.  Much more dramatic,  but I kind of liked the blues because they are so unusual.

These more northerly sediments have more iron oxide.

The Painted Desert Inn was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps and was famous in the 30s and 40s.  

From the pictures, I don't think that it was originally adobe coated.

I had fun wandering through and seeing all of the furniture, paintings, and pictures.  But here was my very favorite:

I have a silver pin of this cat that Tracy, Gina, or Susan Eshelman gave to me years ago.  I've always loved it, but did not know where it came from.  Apparently some of the CCC boys who were building the inn found the carving tumbled upside down at the bottom of a slope, and eventually the rock was returned to the inn.