Monday, September 23, 2013

VALLEY OF THE GODS

Saturday, September 21 – We hit the trail again early this morning to drive through the Valley of the Gods.

Valley of the Gods

Now this is more like it! Much better than Monument Valley. In our minds you can skip Monument Valley and instead enjoy the Valley of the Gods.

The Valley is administered by Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and they do a terrific job maintaining the road through the area. The 17-mile loop road is a graded gravel and clay surface road that has a few sharp turns and crosses several washes. It is suitable for most passenger cars when the road conditions are dry. Driving time is approximately two hours.

road conditions

The beautiful Cedar Mesa sandstone monoliths, pinnacles, and other geological features of this amazing area along with the accessibility make it far superior to Monument Valley, in our opinion.

Valley of the Gods

During the drive through the valley you see a number monoliths which have been given local names. A guide is available to help identify each feature, but it is equally fun to name them yourself, depending on what you think they look like.

Seven Sailors
Seven Sailors

Hen sitting on the butte.
 setting hen butte

The next one is called Balanced Rock and Lady in a Tub. See her little toes sticking up.

balanced rock/lady in a tub

Marsha named this one Locomotive. See the moon. This is two days after the Harvest moon.

locomotive

Before things begin getting hot and hazy, we recommend you head to the Valley early. That provides the best lighting for viewing and photography.

Fragile foliage.
foliage

foliage

We were permitted to hike to any landmark of our choosing.

Castle Butte.
Castle butte

Being BLM land, you are free to spend the night along the road in beautiful sites found among the rocks. Our 5th wheel is too big to get down the road comfortably.

truck

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all back real soon. Have a great day!

6 comments:

  1. It's amazing what we see in the buttes...kind of like what we see in puffy clouds. Lots of fun!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Another beautiful area to add to the bucket list. Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
  3. We didn't get to Monument Valley except for pictures I took as we passed by the area. Once settled in Bluff, we decided the drive wasn't worth it with Valley of the Gods right there.

    What a beautiful place! I love when the rocks take on a feature you can identify. Your Locomotive rock does fit especially with the "smoke" from it trailing in the sky! Good name!

    The brilliant blue skies light up the red rock in such a gorgeous way.

    You deserved this beautiful day:)

    ReplyDelete
  4. We weren't impressed with Monument Valley, either. No way were we spending that kind of money for the tours. Besides, like you said, you can just drive through Valley of the Gods and see similar rocks for free!

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for leaving us a comment. We enjoy reading them. Have a great day!