We left San Antonio to begin our westward journey on Friday,
February 28th. We drove about
300 miles westward on Interstate 10, ending our day in Fort Stockton – deep in
the heart of Texas! If you’ve never
driven through West Texas, you’re missing out! There are miles and miles and miles of
nothingness!
On the second day on the road we traveled another 400 miles
northward, going right through southeastern New Mexico. And if I ever thought West Texas was bad, I
obviously had never driven through southeastern New Mexico! There weren’t even billboards to read along
the way to entertain us, although we did have fun watching the tumbleweed cross the road in front of us. What a boring
drive! We ended our day in Albuquerque,
New Mexico, by staying overnight at Kirtland AFB.
On the third day on the road, we drove due westward from
Albuquerque into Arizona, stopping at Petrified Forest National Park along the
way.
We arrived at the park right at lunchtime. It’s a good thing we didn’t arrive any earlier. According to the park ranger, the park had
received four inches of snow early that morning! By the time we arrived, it had all melted
except for a few isolated spots in shaded areas. What luck!
We started off as we normally do, by watching the park film
at the visitor center. Then we drove –
WITH the camper - through the park roads to see the sights along the way. Interstate 40, which is the east-west road we
were driving on, runs right through the national park, bisecting it into a
northern section and a southern section.
North of the interstate is the Painted Desert. We stopped at several viewing points to see
the panorama of the desert, stopping at the historic Painted Desert Inn along
the way. The inn served as a resting
point for travelers along the historic Route 66, and it contains wall murals by
Hopi artist Fred Kabotie in the dining room and elsewhere in the inn.
On the park road just before crossing over the interstate
into the southern portion of the park is a memorial to Route 66. This famous road was the first highway across
the country, linking the eastern United States to the west coast. Route 66 started in Chicago, went through
Missouri , Oklahoma, the panhandle of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, then finally
ended in California. For decades it was the only
automobile route that crossed the country. When the interstate system was introduced in
the 1950’s, Interstate 40 replaced Route 66.
Finally in 1985 the road was decommissioned. Today there are some historical remnants of
Route 66, but most sections of the famed route are completely gone. The Petrified Forest National Park is the
only national park through which Route 66 ran. Today there is a small memorial to the
legendary road.
After crossing over the interstate highway and entering into
the southern portion of the park, our first stop was at Puerco Pueblo. This was a 100-room Native American village
built between 1250 and 1380. We walked
over a short paved trail through the site to see the ruins and historic
petroglyphs on the sides of the rocks.
Since we were pressed for time, we continued our drive
through the park but skipped over some of the attractions. We ended our visit by stopping at the far
south end of the park and going to the Rainbow Forest Museum (where Jonny completed the Junior Ranger badge), where the best concentrated examples of
petrified wood can be seen. This was
certainly a forest! The petrified wood
can be seen strewn over miles and miles of the park, but especially over the
many acres near the museum. We walked
along the Long Logs Trail and the Giant Logs Trail and saw some exquisite
examples of the colorful mineral deposits that created the petrification of the
fallen ancient forest dating back to when this area of the country was a tropical
forest at the equator. Hard to believe,
since it’s now a flat desert nowhere near the equator!
After spending two hours touring the park, we got back onto
the interstate and drove to our final destination: The Grand Canyon!
