In yesterday's blog entry I forgot to mention the stars. Not Jim and Garret, the stars, I'm talkin' the celestial kind. Mike had suggested that we find a dark road somewhere away from the city (THAT ISN'T HARD HERE). On our way home from Needles Overlook, we stopped off on the side of the highway and star gazed for a little bit. It was beautiful. The sky was so bright and sparkly. It was pitched black except for the moon and stars.
Today, Jim, myself and Dasher went to Hovenweep National Park. It's a place of ancient Indian structures. As we drove, there would be a sign indicating Hovenweep 20 miles, then we came to the end of the road, another sign indicated Hovenweep 6 miles, and at the end of that road was another sign Hovenweep 10 miles. Yeah, a run on sentence, kinda like the ongoing signs. We finally make it. For this ancient site, much like the Chaco, they're not really sure why these people left. I had an answer for that, and I have one for this civilization too. Let's see, everytime they tried to go somewhere, it was only 6 miles but then another 10 miles and then another stretch. I think they died off while traveling!
On the first path we took, Dasher decided to crap on the sidewalk. We were prepared with a plastic poop bag but of course there was no trash can so we had to walk back to the visitor center. I sure wasn't gonna carry a bag of crap around.
On the first path we took, Dasher decided to crap on the sidewalk. We were prepared with a plastic poop bag but of course there was no trash can so we had to walk back to the visitor center. I sure wasn't gonna carry a bag of crap around.
Back to the Hovenweep....... we walked a trail (I have photos) that was interesting and very difficult at times. The structures were interesting as well. Dasher was a trooper. To commemorate his success, he crapped again.
We returned home for lunch, and dropped off Dasher. Next we headed to Blanding to do some shopping at an Alco. We've seen these stores around here and there, particularly in small towns and wondered what they were about. It was a nice break from ruins and rock formations. Basically, Alco is very similar to Big Lots. Jim shopped their boots section and I suggested repeatedly, the boots pictures below. I hope the flash on the camera didn't bounce off of them.
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Here's some more Hovenweep snapshots:
We walked up and down stuff like this. It was like exercise or something.
Yeah, we walked through there too.
Yep, up there too!
By the way, our GPS tells us how far away something is in what Jim and I call Sky Miles. If it's 8 miles, it means without obstacles, a direct course would be 8 miles. Once you select it and tell it to go, then it gives you an ETA. I bring this up because we found something 8 miles away. After selecting "GO", the ETA was 2 hours later. 2 hours for 8 miles! We decided against it. Damn mountains are always in the way.
I'm glad you took my advice on the star-gazing. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did - and do when I get the chance.
ReplyDeleteAnd by the way, what you and Jim call "skymiles" most southerners refer to with the phrase "as the crow flies," i.e. "It's about 10 miles from here as the crow flies."
word.