A Vintage Domestic Chemist: Painted and Petrified

Oh boy! Talk about a whirlwind of summer so far.

I'm going to have to break it up a bit for a few posts.
So here we go!

Let's see, what's new?

Well, Mr K and Mochi and I went out to California for my sister-in-law's wedding.

ROAD TRIP!

(Hi newlyweds!)

But since we were driving, we decided to make a few stops on the way out. Got to see Route 66, the Petrified Forest, the Painted Desert and of course, the Grand Canyon. But this post will mainly be about the Painted Desert and the Petrified Forest.

What can I say?

IT WAS SO MUCH FUN!

And the best part about it was that it was pet friendly! Yay!

Here are a few shots just on the drive out to AZ.

I am in love with the Southwest here. Absolutely gorgeous!
Then, we turned off and drove up to the Petrified Forest, on the Northern side of the highway.
Or as the ranger told us, the RIGHT way to come.

Hehe. That tip from a dog owner at the dog park was GOLD, I tell you. GOLD.

We all stretched our legs a bit while Mr. K went in to get the pass.

Photo Op!

Then we drove again to the spots. It was great. We got to a lookout and stopped.
The wind was so strong, it was all I could do to try to take a steady shot without getting blown away.

I think it worked.

Then I decided I'd try to get fancy with some color snatching.

Which one do you like? I like the black and blue one, personally. But that may just be me.

Black and white photos rule in my book.

We hopped back in and got to another place. This time they had a hiking trail so we definitely enjoyed that!

The Painted Desert is so pretty. I mean, just look at those colors!

With a partly cloudy sky, it just says Southwest to me.

My turn with the Moch-ster.

Mr. K too.

She was a happy pup.

But the best part was all the texture you could see on the trail.

Gorgeous.

And even the desert looked pretty sharp in Black and White.

But I still prefer it in all it's color.

Oldest inn in the desert.

Lovely adobe style.

And look! Pink rocks!
Mr. K found these.

So after the hike we hopped back in and continued on the road...which turned out to cross Route 66. Yay!

They even had an old car, complete with wood structure, at the intersection.

And lest we forget the sign we drove past, it was stamped onto the paver at the stop.

We continued on.
It was quite hot by this time. And the next stop allowed for some AC driving.

Now, I was probably the only one who'd never heard of a Petroglyph, but I soon learned what they were.

After taking a picture of the rocks and wondering why they didn't look like newspapers, that is...

I overheard a family try to find some pictures and zoomed my camera in on a rock.
Low and behold! Petroglyphs are rock carvings!

Well, once I found one set, I was on the hunt for more.

And more.

And then the genius in me thought, "Hey, why not try to see if there's more detail in black and white?"
So I did just that.

And there was.

It was pretty awesome. We hopped back in and drove towards Blue Mountain. This is a shot from the drive.

And then we found it!

But driving on, we discovered that what we'd seen earlier wasn't exactly it. This next shot was the real deal.

Blue Mountain and so pretty.

Hudus!

By this time it was going on 4pm. We headed out to see some petrified wood.

Petrified.

The colors in the logs amazed me.

Not to mention the landscape. Stark and yet so interesting!

Apparently it was a big deal for people to steal the crystals in the logs.
Hence the holes.
It's forbidden now, by the way.

Okay, taking a break from the magnificent logs.
Have you ever seen a doofy grin on a puppy?
Well, Mochi takes the cake.

Yeah, baby!

Back to the forest!

I want to know if the logs fell like that and then cracked or if they were strategically placed...still many years ago...but the question lingers in my mind.