Today we headed out of Winslow and onto the Navajo Reservation....destination Canyon de Chelley (Shey). It was a pretty uneventful trip up to the canyon except we can say that it was pretty frustrating to have a road as straight as this and have a speed limit of only 55 mph. Really Stevie just wanted to drop the hammer and go FAST!

So we arrived in Chinle and met our Navajo guide Aaron. Although Canyon de Chelley is a National Monument it sits on the Reservation and thus you can only enter the canyon with a licensed Navajo guide in their 4 wheel drive vehicle. So, we got into Aaron's Wrangler and we were off! Here were some pictures of our venture out into the canyon. Right now the "wash" as it is called since it is sometimes completely dry and sometimes up to 4 feet deep was about 2 feet in the deepest areas.

We saw more petroglyphs from up to over 2000 years ago! Pretty amazing that these still remain! See this one of a hunting party?

And the humpbacked flute player?

And the antelope?

We saw lots of old ruins from the Anasazi people! Still I am amazed at how they climbed up into these homes and how they built them. Aaron said they either had ladders or build notches in the stone. Oh yeah, so that would have been easy for me....

Finally we visited Katherine a Navajo woman who comes into the canyon every morning to do farming of her garden and animals and work on her weaving and then leaves the canyon every evening. She farms the land that has been in her family for generations. Here she is demonstrating how she makes her own yarn and then weaves her rugs. Amazing.

And finally we arrived tonight in Monument Valley. We will tour tomorrow, but here is a preview as this is what we can see from our balcony!

Well we started the day by heading out to find that corner in Winslow, Arizona to stand on and guess what? We found someone to join us!

And then we even found a flatbed Ford! Pretty cool!

So we headed off down good ole' Route 66! We found some pretty cool stuff on that old road. Like the Wigwam Motel in Holbrook,

And this old Dairy Queen sign!

And this old car that was abandoned off of Route 66 during the Dust Bowl.

So we finally made it to the Painted Desert and Petrified Forest and let me say it was really interesting and yet again had may different landforms!

The Petrified Forest is full of pieces of wood that were washed down a prehistoric river over 200 million years ago. The logs got stuck under the water and were buried under many layers of volcanic rock, soil, and other minerals and rocks. Over the years the wood cells were replaced with quartz cells when the water carried the different minerals into the wood and preserved them. They were uncovered many years later through the elements and at that time were "petrified" Pretty neat as they really are rock solid and hard.

And this one is called "Old Faithful" due to the weight and size. It was huge!

We traveled on into the Painted Desert where we saw these "tepees" that were formed and given their different colors from different minerals. Thus painted...very pretty!

This beautiful scene is another one of the red rocks of the Painted Desert.

We even saw Newspaper Rock with some petroglyphs.

And back in Winslow we saw this neat little guy. Kinda reminded me of Luigi from the movie Cars or of an antique Smart Car!

We have made it to Arizona and are starting on our Spring Break Adventure 2015. Let me just say to those of you who are reading this back home that I really hope we can bring the Arizona weather back with us as it is absolutely gorgeous out here. There has not been a cloud in the sky and the temperatures have been in the upper 70s. I know it is a promise of things to come soon back at home.

We left Sedona this morning and had a final destination of Winslow. However, we decided to make several stops along the way. And before you think it no, we did not stand on a corner in Winslow....yet...but hopefully tomorrow we will be able to do so!

We started our adventure with a stop at Sunset Crater National Park. It is amazing to me that we left the red rocks of Sedona, moved into Flagstaff which had this beautiful mountain covered in snow...

And then we moved into Sunset Crater which was an active volcano 900 years ago. The bottom of the crater area still has major areas of lava flow remains that are fantastic formations. However, we chose not to hike on the lava flow because to be honest I don't have the best track record with stability on terrain like that, and I really wanted to be able to walk the rest of our trip. However, the formations were truly a sight to see.

Finally we got to see Sunset Crater the volcano that caused it all!

Then we headed out to Wupatki National Monument. This is a Hopi Pueblo that is really well preserved. In fact, we were able to walk about to the pueblo, climb up into it, and walk through the rooms. This dated from over 1000 years ago. Pretty amazing that this has remained standing through all the elements of this area (wind, rain, snow, heat, cold). 

Finally we headed to Walnut Canyon to see a completely different form of dwelling for Native Americans. While walking along the canyon trail we were able to see cliff dwellings. I am still questioning how these people ever came up with the idea to build their homes in a cliff and how they ever got into their homes. Makes me sorry for complaining about having to walk the few yards I have to walk and the 10 steps I have to walk with my groceries into my condo.

And we ended up in Winslow....tomorrow hopefully we will find that corner to stand on...and who knows...a flatbed Ford!