Petrified Forest, Arizona

Wednesday morning we left Albuequerque, New Mexico and drove west to the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. We stayed the night in an RV park about 12 miles west of the park. Thursday morning we were up bright and early and headed to the Petrified Forest. The drive through the park is 26 miles one-way.

We stopped at almost every viewpoint and trailhead in the park. Connie's stepmeter clocked over 17,000 steps for the day. We started at the south end of the park with a tour of the museum and then did both the big logs and long logs trails. The long logs trail has the most petrified wood in the park. We did the Crystal Forest walk which has lots of petrified wood of various colors. Next was the blue mesa nature hike. We also stopped at Newspaper rock. This was Bob's favorite stop in the park. Lots of petrographs were visible here.

The north end of the park has some beautiful views of the painted desert. We did a short rim walk here, but we're too tired to do the whole walk. We had a great day here in the park - nice weather - sunny and in the high 50's with no wind.

Friday we head west towards the Grand Canyon.