Blogs from Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona, United States, North America

40W to New Mexico is very different landscape from TX ?more green ? more hills Still extremely windy...75 mph highway against the wind. Subie gas ⛽️ mileage averaging 22 miles to the gallon ? Mountains and expansive views...land, land, land. McCalls Pumpkin Patch and Haunted Farm - packed with people and pumpkins ? Back to 65 mph...pass signs for the Cibola National Forest and the National Museum of Nuclear Science. Adobe style ? homes...University of New ?? Mexico. Yellow and turquoise license plates. Stopping for a late lunch/early dinner at the Standard Diner - 2008 episode of Diner's Drive Ins and Dives (DDD) ? It's a refurbished circa 1938 Texaco Station on Historic Route 66 dishing out inventive American diner eats. Jennifer and Jason - you would love this place! Karen ordered what Guy Fieri had: ... read more

Petrified Forest - Versteinerter Wald vor vielen, vielen Jahren stand da mal ein Wald. Die Bäume sind dann abgestorben, und z.B. von einem Fluss mitgetragen worden, und schlussendlich irgendwo liegen geblieben. Während der darauffolgenden Aonen sind die Bäume von Sediment überlagert worden. Wasser ist im Boden eingesickert und wurde dann von den vergrabenen Bäumen aufgenommen. Die Flüssigkeit ist dann vertrocknet und die im Wasser gelösten Mineralien sind in den Bäumen verblieben und haben so diesen Versteinerten Wald gebildet. Nach und nach wurde auch das Sediment wieder abgetragen und hat die nun versteinerten Bäume freigegeben. So ist der Petrified Forest National Park entstanden.... read more

Day 6 of the road trip takes us to the Petrified Forest. We got a late start due to the car problem, so we dropped our plans to go to Sedona. However, we were not disappointed, we entered the park via Route 40, the views of the Painted Desert were spectacular. Although Route 66 generally follows the path of the current Route 40, the original Route 66 cut through the Painted Desert at the park, which is still marked with a line of telephone poles. The Petrified trees are located at the southern end of the park, 27 miles from where we entered. It was extremely windy, as seen on some of the photos of my hair. The pictures speak for themselves, but do not do it justice. We had dinner in Historic Flagstaff at a ... read more

When we left Flagstaff, it was a cold, threatening morning. We drove east on old route 66 and it never rained on us all day. At Holbrook we turned off and went the back way into the Petrified forest. What a wonderful place to re-explore! Driving north throught the park we crossed route 66 again and stopped at the Route 66 wayside memory stop. Continuing on we were able to get some great color on the painted desert.... read more

Painted Desert and Petrified Forest - October 18th As we left the Rockies, dropping down from the mountains, the landscape changed around us quickly. We were now in a vast desert area with deep red mountains as a back drop and giant boulders that looked like they'd just been placed there. As we crossed int the border into Arizona we stopped for fuel and were given an alternative route suggested by a nice Mexican which he said was very scenic. I was also amused by the writing on the toilet wall... Person 1: "Hey Gringo, leave my wife alone!" Person 2: "We'll come and get me then you f**k!" The route was certainly scenic and took us through very baron land and through towns and villages off the beaten track. Farms and houses built as shacks ... read more