19-February-2024. Petrified Forest National Park

This morning I left Gallup, NM and headed an hour southwest to Petrified Forest National Park. I've got to say I expected to be in a forest with fallen petrified trees around me .... and boy was I wrong .... I was in the middle of a desert!

I want to start today's post with when I left Gallup - . a huge long train crossing in front of me reminded me how I wanted to share my experience with rail activity in this part of the country. I've noticed over the past few weeks how extremely active the rail system is. Lots and lots and lots of extremely long trains zooming along at about 80 MPH through the vast remote areas of the U.S. As I stayed overnight in Gallup for a couple of nights I noticed the train whistles were constant (yes, even all through the night) - it was really amazing to realize how many rail cars passed through this town every day. Good that all those rail cars are not trucks on the highway - there would never be enough room as the highway is ready filled with too many 18-wheelers.

The big surprise of the day came an hour later when I turned off the highway and entered Petrified Forest National Park .... only to see an endlessly flat desert landscape with not a tree or shrub insight. Definitely no forest here!

I stopped at the Ranger station and picked up a map and was told that the park consists of a 28 mile long road (point to point, so you exit the park 28 miles south of where you started) with 12 scenic stops. The first 4 stops were actually in the Painted Desert, and only a mile or so after the visitor center the flat desert scrub brush dropped into a beautiful colorful canyon . The painted desert consists of about 40,000 acres of land where water has washed through various layers of colorful soil resulting in deep chasms and peaks appearing to be striped. There were many overlooks and short walks and everywhere you looked was incredibly beautiful and colorful and breathtaking.

The road continued on and the National Park Service has left a 1932 Studebaker on the remnants of what used to be famous Route 66 that once cut through the park. Cute. Historic Route 66 is a big deal in these parts.

After crossing over the old Route 66 (which now has been replaced by interstate 40) I finally entered into the petrified forest region of the Park. One area where I spent quite a bit of time is called the teepees, so named because the Native Americans thought the pyramid shaped hills looked just like teepees - and they do! I took a 3 mile hike up into the teepees and had some stunning views of the surrounding landscape. From there I went to the Blue Mesa which has a 1 mile hiking trail that drops you down into the badlands where you have your first glimpses of pieces of petrified wood. The ancient trees here all seemed to be 18 inch chunks that almost looked like they had been cut into logs.

I learned that this area used to be a lush tropical forest back in the Pangaea days when this landmass was much closer to the equator. Trees from the tropical forest would fall down into nearby rivers and swamps and be covered with silt and sediment which prevented them from decaying. Instead they crystallized over many thousands of years. During this time the landmass that was initially near the equator migrated north and got pushed up and became the high desert landscape of today. Mother Nature uncovered the petrified trees through erosion and wind. Because these trees are crystallized they are fragile and can easily crack - hence breaking about every 18 inches or so. That's why it looks like there's lots of debris of cut logs – they're not really cut they're just long trees that have broken apart.

The first few stops where I saw petrified tree remains they were all much smaller pieces and the latter stops had some longer logs that still were intact.

A subsequent stop at "Chrystal Forest" showed how the woods's crystal structure is

colorful and glimmers in the sunlight. Overall not what I had expected to find but a very interesting day of discovery. Picture order is a little mixed up below – I'm having trouble with the gallery today and it's just not letting me move pictures around.

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After leaving the petrified forest I drove another hour west to Winslow, AZ . Glenn Frey had written the song "Take It Easy" with famous lyrics "Standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona, such a fine sight to see" which became a the Eagles first big hit in 1972. I couldn't resist standing on the corner and taking a few pictures with the bronze statue of Glenn Frey and also with the flat bed Ford mentioned in the song. Route 66 has so many fun historical gems!