Passion 4 Travel

United States

Days 11-12: Monument Valley & Canyonlands - We drove to Utah and Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park. Located near "Four Corners" (the intersection of Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Arizona), Tse' Bii' Ndzisgaii as it is known to the Navajo is a 91,696 acre park extending across Utah and Arizona, a small part of the 16 million acre Navajo reservation which our Danish companion estimated was at least the same size as Denmark! We enjoyed an entertaining and educational Navajo Jeep Trek. Monument Valley is so called because alot of its freestanding rock formations, mesas and buttes look like monuments, shapes or statues (with some you have to use your imagination a bit) such as a coffee pot, tea pot, sugar bowl, dragon etc. There are also old paintings on the rocks. Quite interesting on its own but nothing extraordinary. What made the trip special was the additional learning about Navajo tradition and culture - they could definitely teach the rest of the world a thing or two! Part 3 of my favourite trilogy was filmed here too - Back to the Future III

Day 12 was an early start to watch the sunrise over Monument Valley (we camped at the valley overnight and it was very windy). From there we went to Mexican Hat Rock, so called because it err resembles a Mexican Hat and then onwards to Canyonlands National Park. 2 canyons carved by the Green and Colorado Rivers are surrounded by three vast and very different regions with water cutting flat layers of sedimentary rock into hundreds of canyons, mesas, buttes, fins, arches and spires. It was quite impressive but probably would have been more so if I had not seen the Grand Canyon first. Apparently when the park was established in 1964 only Indians, Cowboys, River Explorers and Uranium Prospectors had dared to enter this rugged area of SE Utah. Even today it mainly has unpaved roads and primitive trails through its 527 sq mile interior.