Petrified Forest and Around

I find that all these mesas, canyons and rock formations are starting to look the same. Therefore, petrified logs are a pleasant and exciting change, especially to a chronic rock hound like myself. At the gate I had to show them all the rocks in my van and mark them because this park is very strict about collecting. The fines are very high so I didn't even try it.

There are many trails and overlooks in the park. One had signs identifying the native plants and telling about the usage of them by the natives and early settlers to the region. Absolutely ingenious, I say. Also very interesting. As for the vistas, they are looking down at what they call petrified dunes, pink-orange in the late afternoon sun. The next day I was in the south end of the park where the formations were above ground and more white with a purplish tinge.

Petrified logs are everywhere! Some were long sections of trees, broken up as evenly as though they'd been cut with a saw. There are so many stumps and chips everywhere. The fact that they are so colorful is what impressed me. They have the usual orange, brown and black but whites, ochers, even purples were also represented. Wow.

 

 

Outside the park and in the countryside close by. People decorate their yards with large stumps of petrified wood. In Holbrook, AZ, I found a building, now abandoned that was faced with copper ore and petrified wood. Some of the wood was in log crosscuts and polished. I though it was beautiful, even with boarded up windows. At one end of town, an entry, I suppose, I found a statue of a cowboy riding a huge petrified tree like a bronc. You would think they'd use real petrified wood but they didn't. I checked. As one woman told me: "Its everywhere but if you look for it, you won't find it."