Canyon Country

As we learned last Wednesday, there is much more to Dinosaur National Monument than dinosaur bones.  At least half of the park is the canyon country of the Green and Yampa Rivers.  In order to access canyon country, we took the thirty-one mile drive to Harpers Corner on the Colorado side of the park the next day.  This part of the park is not as well-known as the area containing the dinosaur quarry.  In fact, there are no dinosaurs here.  Tim and I have both traveled extensively in this part of the west, and neither one of us had been to this part of Colorado.  I’m so glad we decided to take this drive.

I would hate to guess how many times I’ve used the words “spectacular,” “amazing,” “awesome” or “stunning” to describe what we’ve seen on this trip.  Despite their overuse, the canyons we saw today can only be described that way.  From a series of overlooks and trails, we looked down at the labyrinth canyons that had been cut deeply into the rocks.  Sheer cliffs, great faults and rainbow-hued rocks only added drama to the scene.    

Plug Hat Butte

The Beginning of Canyon Country

A Road Leading Down into the Canyon

Labyrinth Canyons

An unexpected treat was seeing the wildflowers that bloom in the spring at these high elevations.  A profusion of yellow, red and blue blossoms seemed to flourish in the arid environment.  These delicate flowers were such a stark contrast to the wildness of the canyons.

A Profustion of Wildflowers

Globemallow

Butterfly on the Scarlet Gilia

When we reached the end of the road, we hiked to the end of Harpers Corner to take in the most dramatic view of all, the confluence of the Green and Yampa Rivers.  We climbed through pinyon pine and juniper forests on our way to the tip of a promontory overlooking the canyons.  It’s hard to describe just how rugged these canyons appear from above.  I don’t know how high we were above the rivers, but the rafts we spotted floating down the Green River appeared no larger than small dots.  The view from this spot was one that I will not easily forget.

The End of the Trail

Yampa River Canyon

Green River Canyon

Tim and Sarah at Canyon Country

We retraced our steps and left Dinosaur National Monument.  We drove eastward across a lonely stretch of northwestern Colorado and camped for the night at Yampa River State Park.  It was a long, but good day.

Dinosaurland

We’re home!  I’ll write more about our homecoming in the coming week, but for now I’ll just catch up on the posts from our last week on the road.  Most likely, I’ll post one “catch-up” per day, so stay tuned.  Then I plan to do a series of wrap-up posts.  After that, who knows?  We’ll just have to see.

The town of Vernal Utah, and surrounding Uintah County capitalize on their proximity to Dinosaur National Monument and the quantity of fossils found in the region.  The area even refers to itself as Dinosaurland, and a pink dinosaur welcomes visitors to the town.

Dinosaur National Monument takes its name from an incredible deposit of dinosaur fossils that were first discovered in 1909.  The quarry here is one of the best late-Jurassic Period dinosaur finds in the world.  This quarry yielded the remains of more than 500 dinosaurs, and more than ten species of dinosaurs were discovered.  Twenty complete skeletons were unearthed.

We visited Dinosaur National Monument last Wednesday and were able to explore the original quarry and even touch dinosaur bones.  The Quarry Exhibit Hall is actually built over and into the side of the quarry, and what remains of the quarry wall is exposed inside the building.  Looking up, or down, at a two-story high wall filled with more than 1,500 dinosaur bones was an amazing experience.  Most of the bones appeared randomly, but there were several sections of articulated skeletons as well.

Tim Walks Along the Quarry Wall Inside the Quarry Exhibit Hall

One of the More Impressive Dinosaur Fossils in the Quarry Wall

Exposed Dinosaur Bones

What a Amazing Sight

Tim Had to Be Convinced It Was Legal to Touch the Dinosaur Bones

The Exhibit Hall Also Contains Several Impressive Exhibits

The original Quarry Exhibit Hall was built in 1957 as a part of the National Park Service Mission 66 program and was an outstanding example of modernist architecture.  Unfortunately, the building’s foundation was never stable, and long-standing structural problems forced the National Park Service to close the building in 2006.  Luckily, I was able to see the building from the exterior when I visited the park in 2007, although like every other visitor, I could not see the quarry wall inside.  Rangers we spoke with said the hardest part of their job was telling people that the quarry wall was closed.  Some of the visitors had come from half-way around the world and were simply devastated.  There was no access to the quarry wall for five years.

The Newly Opened Quarry Exhibit Hall

The current building opened just last year and is a beautiful piece of architecture.  It is billed as a rehabilitation of the original building, but it really is a reconstruction.  Virtually none of the original structure remains, although the new building does maintain much of the original design.  I’m happy the timing of our visit was such that we were able to go inside and see the quarry wall.

Landscape Adjacent to the Quarry Exhibit Hall

Colorful Cliffs

We found that there is much more to see at Dinosaur National Monument than just dinosaur bones.  The deep and colorful canyons of the Green and Yampa Rivers are preserved here, as are the historic remnants of ancient cultures, settlers and homesteaders.  We took the Tour of the Tilted Rocks to discover some of these features.  Along this route we were able to view some of the finest-quality petroglyphs I’ve ever seen.  This rock art was made about 1,000 years ago by the people of the Fremont Culture, and some of the images are enormous in size.  Petroglyphs like the lizard likely took months to complete.

An Outstanding Collection of Petroglyphs

Intricate Images

The Lizard Is a Favorite Figure

We also visited the restored cabin built by Josephine Bassett in 1935 on land she homesteaded in 1914.  Josie was an independent woman who lived alone here on her own terms.  It is hard to imagine the challenges she faced in this isolated and rugged, but beautiful land.

Josie Bassett Cabin

We followed the Green River for a while and learned how the river was responsible for creating a host of amazing geological features.  The rugged ridge of Split Mountain, which the Green River split in half, for example, loomed alongside of us for much of the way.  Colorful cliffs and unusual rock formations only added to the spectacular scenery.

The Green River Winds Its Way through the Park

Split Mountain

Cliffs Along the Green River

We drove to Dinosaur, Colorado, so we could visit the Colorado section of Dinosaur National Monument tomorrow.  For the first time on this trip, we were unable to find a campground.  The one where we had planned to stay was virtually abandoned.  We didn’t have a good feeling about the place, so we dumped our tanks and left.  We never did see anyone there.  Thus began a search for a place to camp in an area where there simply were no campgrounds.

By this time it was 6:00 pm, and we realized we would have to find a place to boondock, in other words, park off of a main road in an area with no facilities.  We turned onto a county road and then found a dirt road managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM).  There was a nice open space to park, and that’s where we camped for the night.  I can’t believe our first experience with boondocking took place the last week of our trip. 

Our Boondocking Site

 

Aquarium in Stone

We drove east from Idaho today through an expansive landscape.  Alas, we left the state without visiting the potato museum.  We just didn’t have time to do everything!  We made a detour in order to drive along the west shore of Bear Lake, which straddles the Idaho-Utah border.  Sometimes called the Caribbean of the Rockies, Bear Lake is twenty miles long and is a beautiful shade of blue.  Although we enjoyed the lake views, the neighboring communities did not tempt us to linger.

Storm Clouds Looming Over the Wide Open Spaces

Bear Lake

We kept driving, picked up the Oregon Trail once again and crossed into the wide open spaces of southwest Wyoming.  One more national park was on our agenda, Fossil Butte National Monument.  We’ve visited several national parks where fossils are the focus, including Hagerman Fossil Beds National Monument and John Day National Monument. Fossil Butte is my new favorite, at least as far as the fossils are concerned, although John Day still wins out on scenery.

Fossil Butte National Monument preserves an extraordinarily rich and diverse fossil deposit dating back fifty million years.  What makes Fossil Butte so special is the fact that the fossils found here are among the world’s most perfectly preserved remains of ancient plant and animal life.  

The displays at the visitor center are exceptionally well-presented, and we just couldn’t believe the incredible detail of the fossils on view.  Nine-foot palm fronds, countless fish species and softshell turtles were just a few of the fossils that we looked at in amazement. Many fish even retained their entire skeleton, teeth, scales and skin.  It seems fitting that Fossil Butte has often been called an Aquarium in Stone.  No one knows for sure what events led to the preservation of Fossil Lake’s animals and plants, but many scientists believe that an essential ingredient was burial in calcium carbonate.

The Fossilized Plant Wall

Over 20 Species of Freshwater Fish Have Been Identified

An Amazing Amount of Detail Has Been Preserved

Even Fossils of Turtles Have Been Found

Another very cool feature at Fossil Butte is a Journey Through Time that records events in the Earth’s history beginning 4.5 billion years ago.  The timeline starts on the entrance road and continues along the railing outside the visitor center.  Here the timeline follows the Earth’s history as it evolved into what we know it today.  It was fun to spot some of our favorite events.  Other national parks known for their fossils were also placed in their respective places in time.


The Beginning of the Journey Through Time

The Journey Through Time Continues at the Visitor Center

Fossil Butte, for Which the Park Was Named, Can Be Seen Behind the Timeline

The landscape at Fossil Butte is also impressive, particularly its namesake feature.  Many of the fossils came from Fossil Lake, which today is a flat-topped rock butte that stands near the center of the ancient lake.  We took the scenic drive into the high country where we were rewarded with breathtaking views of the butte and surrounding sagebrush-covered hills.

An Impressive Landscape

Places of Contemplation and Wonder

There are a number of dark days in the history of the United States.  The incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II is one of those days.  Following the bombing of Pearl Harbor, hostility and suspicion toward people of Japanese ancestry intensified, and all Japanese were treated as potential spies.  Wartime hysteria prompted President Franklin D. Roosevelt to authorize the relocation of persons from designated areas for the purpose of national security.

Over 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry living on the West Coast were interred in ten relocation centers.  We visited one of those centers today, the Minidoka National Historic Site near Jerome, Idaho.  Here approximately 13,000 Japanese, most of whom were American citizens, were interred for the duration of the war.  Only the foundations of two of the camp’s structures remain today, but the site at Minidoka evokes the harsh life that existed behind barbed war.

Only Remnants of the Reception Building Remain

Remains of the Military Police Building Mark the Entrance Station

Barbed Wire Surrounded the Camp

Despite their internment, most Japanese Americans remained extremely loyal to the United States, and many volunteered for military service.  Minidoka had the highest number of volunteers of the ten relocation centers.  Visiting Minidoka brought home the message that we must be vigilant to protect the constitutional rights and freedoms of all citizens and prevent the recurrence of any similar event.  Minidoka is a powerful place.

The Hono Roll Listed the Names of the Internees Serving in World War II

From Minidoka we drove to Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve.  This strange landscape was described by a geologist in 1923 as “the surface of the moon as seen through a telescope.”  Even the legislation establishing the national monument described the area as “a weird and scenic landscape, peculiar to itself.”  Does this make Craters of the Moon an officially “weird” park?

A Weird and Scenic Landscape

Craters of the Moon is all of those things, and it’s a fascinating place to visit.  It appears to be a barren landscape, but it draws you in.  Here, vast amounts of lava flowed not from one volcano, but from long fissures across the Snake River Plain known as the Great Rift.  The Great Rift is the deepest and longest volcanic fissure in the continental United States.  Eight major eruptive periods have occurred beginning approximately 15,000 years ago, with the most recent just 2,000 years ago.

This a wonderful place to learn about volcanic features, from spatter and cinder cones to fissures and rifts.  I thought it was apropos that two Hawaiian words are used to describe the different types of lava flows.  Pahoehoe is smooth or ropy lava, while a’a is rough or jagged lava.  Craters of the Moon is such a good laboratory that NASA’s Apollo astronauts learned basic volcanic geology here in 1969.  

Walking through the Lava Field

Pahoehoe, or Ropy, Lava

A'a, or Jagged, Lava

Life Among the Lava

We hiked to the top of the Inferno Cone where we were rewarded with expansive views of the entire area, including a series of cinder cones lined up along the Great Rift.  What a great perspective on this unique lava field.

Tim on His Way to the Top of Inferno Cone

It's a Long Way Down from the Top of the Cone

Cinder Cones Lined Up along the Great Rift

That Tree Is Just Hanging On Atop the Cone

A Strange, But Surprisingly Wonderful, Place