Utah: Land of Dinosaurs and Sculpted Stone

We took the bike to Vernal, Utah and made a day trip to Dinosaur National Monument. The visitor center is out in the middle of the desert just north of Vernal, but the actual dinosaur wall is a mile stroll through the desert or a quick drive around. We choose the walk. We got to see several desert lizards scurrying about and different fossils marked along the trail. The dinosaur wall was incredible. The archeologist that found the extensive collection of fossils had the vision to try to preserve them in the side of the wall that they were found and they were able to “sell” that idea to the government. So at the end of the hike was this huge pavilion build over a partially excavated wall of dinosaur’s bones. It was very cool.

We spent a couple of day touring around Vernal, we also visited Fantasy Canyon and Moonshine Arch. Fantasy Canyon is an area of unique erosion patterns that was kind of like Mad Max meets Dr. Seuss. It was too windy for the drone but I hope you enjoy the pictures we did get.

Moonshine Arch was about a ~4 mile round trip hike through the plains, with a scramble over rocks for the last half mile. It was a challenge, but well worth the view.  We had the arch to ourselves and we rested there enjoying the vistas from the high ground.

Thanks for checking in on our adventure. We will be picking up the pace now. We are headed to Kentucky and want to see the Grand kids over Halloween and maybe have an early Thanksgiving.