Saturday, September 21, 2019

Monument Valley

It was COLD here this morning in Flagstaff. Had the furnace on all night. Got down to 34 and will only make it to 70 today. Right now there is no wind, hope it stays that way. Today will be a relaxing day mostly. Out to breakfast then home to watch a soccer game and then the NASCAR race from Richmond. Tomorrow on the road again, going to Seligman for the night. Today relax. 
So back to Monument Valley. Again there will be lots of pictures and not too much in way of comments.  
We went to eat dinner then go into the park, by then it was after six o'clock - we wanted the effect of the sunset. When we got to the entrance booth the man inside took our $20 then told us the scenic Valley Drive would be closing in three minutes, but our receipt would be good for the next day too. Hum...it didn't used to close that early. 
So off we went heading to the Valley Drive. Just made it before the gate closed. I have some interesting dash cam videos of the road going in. Will post them when we get home. The views here are awesome. The sun is going down behind us. 

 This formation is called The Elephant, can you see it?
 Lots of red cliffs. 

This is the Three Sisters at John Ford's Point. I have better pictures from the next day.  
 We stopped at John Ford's Point. Where John Ford the movie producer made so may movies. Think John Wayne movies.
These paintings were on the building selling Navajo Fry Bread. Peaceful Spirit series.


 View from that area. More about it when we go back in the morning.  
 Heading back out of the park. This is called The Camel. Use your imagination. 
 Just looking out over the desert.

 The last of the sunlight reflecting on the rock.


One of the mitten formations
 Both of them here  See why they are named the Mittens.
 Cars still leaving the park.

Joking I said lets take a selfie - but had to use the camera to do it. Surprised we were both in it. 
Just scenery. These last few pictures were taken from the terrace of the View Hotel

 Can never get too many pictures.
Did I talk about the KOA in Monument Valley. It is a good place to spend your time there. Much cheaper than Gouldings RV Park. Nice sized pull-throughs, full hook ups. They have WiFi but it is slow when you can pick it up. Our only complaint was - when we came back to the park after visiting Monument Valley in the evening it was dark out. Very hard to find the park's entrance in the dark. Bill mentioned it to the manager. Interesting reason why. The Navajo Nation will not allow any lights in the area because one of the attractions is the brilliant night sky! So no light poles in the RV park and no lights at the entrance. He said it took them over six months to allow them to put a reflective KOA sign by the entrance. 
The next morning we went back into the park when it opened at a little after 8:00 a.m.
Took 303 pictures that day. Will take a while to go through them. We did the entire Valley Drive around the Park. Poor Jeep is pink from all the red dust he has been in lately. 

5 comments:

Carl said...

Amazing scenery. Thanks for posting.

Carol and Bill said...

Utah has some of the most amazing scenery.

Kathy Tycho said...

Love the selfie..looks like someone took your picture and you weren't happy about it!

SandyM said...

Love the photos - please remind how long the Valley Dr is around the park. Thank you for sharing all the photos and brings back good memories of our visit.

Carol and Bill said...

I was just trying to figure out if we were both in the photo. Not much for selfies - more playing around and surprised at the result. Guess using a camera makes it easier.