JOMEL Adventures
Positivity (def): "Anything other than being in the office."
Monument Valley, Utah
USA | Tuesday, 29 April 2008 | Views [632]
The next destination on our road trip was Monument Valley, Utah. There was plenty more desert to look at on this drive and we were getting pretty bored of the sandy desolate scenery, but almost instantly as we turned a corner all the sand and rocks turned red. It was very impressive! The roads were straight and boring but the scenery was getting more and more pretty. Upon arriving at Monument Valley which is located in the Navajo Indian Reservation we were informed that the camping site we had booked at no longer existed as they were building a hotel there, but for $20 we could set up camp on a rocky, exposed carpark. Awesome! But we took up the offer anyway as we pretty much had no other alternative.
We thought we had been prepared by putting up our tent in Sandra's backyard in Albuquerque but realized it didn't help that much because the wind was roaring and we had neglected to work out how the fly attached to the tent with our practice set up. We managed to get the tent set up but not without a good bucket or two of red sand getting blown in. The wind and stinging sand put kind of a downer on the experience and neither of us slept well with the tent flapping around but you couldn't mistake the beauty of the place as the sun set on the red rocks.
Next morning, Wed 30th April, we drove down through the trails which went around some of Monument Valley's most impressive buttes and plateaus and took about 100 photos like a good tourist. Jo was enjoying driving the car through sandy banks and roadways but karma set in when we delibertaely took a 'no entry' road and got bogged in the sand about 10m in. That was the first time we both wished we had bought a 4WD, rather than just a rear wheel drive.
I tried putting rocks under the tyres and even digging the wheels out but they just kept getting deeper and deeper and I was getting more and more angry! So Jo was sent to find help while I fumed in the car. Help arrived half an hour later with an overly prepared Yankee who happened to have a tow rope in his 4WD and promptly pulled us out. Then it was time to drive to the Grand Canyon!
Tags: monument valley, navajo, utah
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