Tuesday 30 October 2012

The Road Trip - Monument Valley

Another site, another set of red rocks.  Are you bored of red rocks yet?  They do end eventually.  In Las Vegas.  In 3 stops time...

Anyway, this was the view from the campsite when we arrived:


And then later on at sunset with a very big lens:


We decided the easiest way to see the area was to take a tour with Gouldings, whose camp ground we were staying in.  The hotel has been there for years and years and decades and things, and was where they used to stay when they came to film a lot of the cowboy and indian films, John Wayne even has his own shrine type thing!  Anyway, our first stop was in a Hogan, one of the Navajo homes just next to Gouldings where we met this lady who showed us how to make a rug and grind flour:


She also played with LT's hair and put it up in a traditional hair bun:


Then we bump bumped down the track into the valley.  There was an awful lot of bumping...


Spot the odd monument...


And just to prove I was there:


This was called Elephant Butte, but it doesn't look like an elephant's behind to me.  I also don't think the Navajo met a lot of elephants back in the old days...


These are the 3 sisters, Faith, Hope and Charity.  Hope's the little one...


This was meant to be the recreation of some film scene but these tourists demanded LT take there photo and took ages to get ready so she didn't have time to run round to where the others were standing, and she was quite cross about that.


Here are some more hogans from the road within the park:


This is an old Indian Brave's face, can you see it?


I don't know about hearing it, but we certainly felt a lot of wind that day!


Look, people were scribbling on walls!  LT says it was okay back in the olden days though:


That was just below the Eye Of The Sun


Some clouds rolled in as we went further, but it didn't rain or anything:


Look, can you see the horse riders?  They were taking a different kind of tour:


And this is where I got to see the tour from.  Please note the open sides, it quite blew my fur about!


As a reward, look what we got for dinner, traditional Navajo blue fry bread:


Rest assured they shared that, although that was the starter size!  We just went back to the RV to have ice cream for dessert and to wind up our very long day...

9 comments:

ginger@bearbits said...

Beautiful photos! Lovely lovely! And what an exciting day for a little bear too. You must be having a grand time. I hope you learned how to do that thing to LT's hair - very unique and it would keep out of the way while she fixes your snacks.

Have fun little bear!

~ginger

Sarah said...

Oh wow Jack, trip of a lifetime no question! Good old native american indians, awffy brave to tame LT's hair... :-PPP xxx

maddyrose said...

Everything looks so big and open and really red. What's with the eye and ear?? The head they're attached to must be huge!
We tried the bun thingy on our mom's hair but her hair is so thin it looked like a breakfast sausage.
Looking forward to seeing more pictures of your trip. The food looks great!! Hugs,
Bellamine & Wendy

Joanne@ Desertmountainbear said...

Wow, such beauty. Thank you for the photos Jack.

Ann said...

You must have felt very, very small in the midst of those wide open spaces and I'm glad there were no cowboys out there practising with their six-shooters. I'm glad too that the Indian lady didn't try to do your hair up like LT's - that would be very own, I should think. I'm looking forward to seeing some other colours in the landscape, at least I hope there will be some others.
Take care,
Ann
Xxx

Archie The Wonder Dog said...

Chuckling at Sarah's comment!

Alan said...

Cor flip Jack, this makes my great big adventure in Munich seem tame, though I did rescue a bear. Were there lots of cowpokes and injuns? Did you rescue anyone?

I see what you meant about that red dust it must have got in ALL your crevices. The worst possibility I can think of is that it might have dried up the hunny in your fur, and that would have been a disaster. What would you have to suck on if your hunny stored got dried up?

That meal looked ace, though I hope you didn't get too close, you might have got lost in all that greenery. And then munchety munch you could have been eaten up. Nah, halloween isn't until tomorrow:-)

I'm looking forward to future instalments, but in the meantime I hope that you and LT have safe flights home.

Hugs,

Jock (and Dad)
XXX

Isisjem said...

Great Pics Jack although you were remarkably camouflaged in one pic good job LT could find you. Sorry you encountered a lot of wind. I hear the cowboy beans do that...

Dianne Neale said...

Wow Jack, this looks awesome (I'm sorry I hate that word, but sometimes, it just fits right