Monument Valley

We live 18 miles from the Utah border, and just a few more from Monument Valley.  While JJ talks about Monument Valley and other famous natural attractions as being places he's always dreamed of seeing, I can't say I'd ever given it much thought.  I remember my Dad always dreaming of taking us out west to Yellow Stone Park, and the Grand Canyon, but I honestly have never heard very much about these other places.  I was a bit surprised to find that I think this rocky, reddish-brown landscape is beautiful.  I tend to favor the lush, green Appalachian Mountains, with deciduous trees that change with the seasons and grass to cover the rolling hills. Growing up in Michigan where you have a variety of landscapes, from fields of corn, and wheat, to the great lakes with their beautiful sand dunes, orchards full of fresh fruits, rolling hills and flat lands, towns and cities that offer variety of their own, I thought the brown desert with very little civilization would depress me, but instead it's inspired awe.

(here we resemble the crayons for the backdrop:) )

 So much of the landscape here looks unreal, like a painted backdrop in our photographs. 

 We weren't able to do any hiking on this visit.  JJ was healing from a foot injury, and so our tour of the Valley was from the van.  but it was beautiful just the same.

This is called Artist Point.  It is a perfect place to spend a day or several, painting the lovely view.

 Like most Americans, Monument Valley was a place I had only seen in Forrest Gump, but it's worth seeing in person, tourists and all.

As we were checking out the above sign, a bus load of Chinese tourists arrived.  As you can see, they take their photography very seriously.

We have discovered that Admrial is quite the tourist attraction as well.  He has been photographed and admired at many of the places we have visited.

If you'd like to visit Monument Valley, remember that you will have a place to stay:)