NOT PETRIFIED IN THE FOREST

The Painted Desert is AWESOME

Friday we returned to the Colorado River at Blythe.  Unfortunately we couldn’t get a riverside spot, but “near the laundry” was just as good, as that need was becoming paramount.    With good cable (it was here we earlier watched Downton Abbey), Deb looked forward to some March Madness.  Unfortunately the time difference was working against us and the only game of any interest we could watch was the USC girls’ game, which they handled with little trouble.  We were able to catch up on scores though and realized the ACC was reigning high, and the other NC teams, UNC-A and Wilmington did not fare quite as well.

Saturday we set off for Arizona, skipping the sites in Quartzsite this time except for their cheap gas.  They were having a Latino Rock Festival… we think they meant music not actual rocks, but in Quartzsite, it is hard to tell.  Mexico license plates dominated the truck stop.  We put Holbrook and the Petrified Forest in our GPS.  Immediately we were informed of an almost 2 hr. traffic delay on I-17.  We monitored it through lunch and the timing had not dwindled so we regrouped and plotted a course through the mountains.  Bessie and Bert performed admirably over the almost 8000 ft. mountains and we saw snow on the ground in the shade, and beautiful desert and mountain vistas littered with saguaro cacti and long leaf pine.

We settled into our campsite about 5 pm….just in time to find most of the rock shops closed.  The local at the RV Park however did point us to “the best one” that was still open.  Dave had been researching petrified wood slabs as a possible table top for his new room and this was one of our “missions.”  We saw a few we liked, but decided to do some comparison shopping the next day, and hoped that the blue laws in Holbrook were lenient.    RoadsideAmerica.com had many pins in Holbrook, most connected to the many concrete dinosaurs dotting the yards of the rock shops.    We took a few pictures for Ella and texted them to her.  According to Emily she is down with a tummy virus.

I asked Dave to abandon Bessie for the night and to stay at this Route 66 "Motel" but he was too  loyal to Bessie!

On Sunday, we drove back through town and hoped the shops would open after church (only about ½ did).  Roadside America had pointed us to a potentially interesting group of “dinosaurs” that were mechanized.  We took the long route to get there that went through the center of the national park.  I didn’t remember this as my favorite park, and couldn’t work up any enthusiasm for the “dead, petrified forests” other than mildly interesting “drive-bys.”  However, when we got to the Painted Desert vistas, my enthusiasm returned.  Each vista was more amazing than the next, and definitely worth the drive.

Stewarts Rock Shop was fun, if a little disappointing.  Go to http://www.roadsideamerica.com/story/13649 to see the Roadside write up.   We laughed at the manikin eating dinos, but were disappointed that they no longer moved.  We did not send these pictures to Ella as she has been in the habit of feeding her dinos Abbie’s small stuffed or plastic pets, and we were afraid for the Barbies if she saw these!!  (When asked why she was feeding cats and dogs to her dinosaurs, she told her mom, “Well they aren’t vegetarians!!”)  We had hoped to find good prices at Stewarts since it wasn’t not on the “main drag”, but he was very proud of his rocks! 

Roadside America points out that folks added these gimicks  to get folks to stop
especially after I-40  replaced Route 66 

On the way back to town and through it, we stopped at a few more shops but didn’t find better prices or any slabs we liked better than at the first shop on Saturday.  Dave had researched  prices over night on the internet and realized that what we were seeing were fairly priced.  After examining several and wrestling with himself over the buying one polished versus unpolished (much cheaper, but not sure if he wanted to learn on something that would require a 2500 mile trip to replace!), Dave chose a beautiful polished piece.  Now he’ll just have to engineer the stand or “legs” for the table.  We all know he has the expertise for that!! 

Back at the RV Park, Deb finished the pillows to go with the girls’ “blankies” and our washing-machine- tub fire attracted a fun couple from Oklahoma.  We drank wine and swapped stories of our day in and out of the park and promised to send them information from our “been there” notebook on the Grand Canyon, Yosemite, and California Wine country.

We could see I-40 from our site and it looked like the pipeline to home to Deb.  Dave outlined several possible stops depending on how the traffic and his driving endurance holds up each day.    As I write this we are progressing through New Mexico and will probably be close to Texas tonight.  Roadside America gave us a much needed stretch break outside of Albuquerque.   It pointed us to the “singing highway” designed by National Geographic as an experiment to see if, given a reward, folks would reduce their speed to a set speed limit.    Finding it right beside I-40 on a parallel road (the old Route 66), we were unsuccessful on our first pass with the RV.  But a drop point was convenient, and we unhitched Bert and drove the ¼ mile stretch 3 more times, taking a video on the last 2 passes. The music is caused by the tires going over rumble strips at the "right" speed.  You can see them in the video. You may have to listen carefully, but it is worth it! 

Unless we find something worth an extra night, our plan is to bring Bessie home with a series of “stop and drops” from here on out.  I’m sure we’ll drive by some places we will want to return to, and we’ll probably miss some great “finds” by sticking mostly to I-40, but we both feel we’ve been successful this trip seeing several things “well” and not setting too ambitious of an itinerary.  Hopefully we will return to whatever we learn we are missing.