Sounds like an odd combination, doesn't it, but that's what Vernal's made of. We traveled from Rock Springs through Flaming Gorge to Vernal, Utah. The scenic highway through the gorge was full of awesome scenery. When we arrived at Vernal, though, I was struck by the amazing sight of unbelievable lush red, pink and white flowers everywhere. The entire town had baskets, bushels, barrels and boxes of flowers everywhere...and they were all real! We stayed at a RV park in town right next to the high school football field. We were able to let the dogs run and play on the field ...until they discovered gophers. Ulysses, being the hunter, first spotted a gopher and took off at top speed to stick his nose in the hole. The second day we took them to run off some energy, Ulysses remembered those holes and as soon as his leash was let loose, he speed like a black streak to the other side of the field. We never could get him to play with Autie and leave the holes alone.
The second day of our stay, we went to the Dinosaur National Monument
and to the various 
musuems in the area. The Utah Field House State Park is the display arena for the various fossils coming out of the area. This was an especially nice museum with a good interactive component that our kids would have loved when they were young. The building's garden is full of life size models of the various dinosaurs interspersed with plants and more of the flowers.
and to the various 
musuems in the area. The Utah Field House State Park is the display arena for the various fossils coming out of the area. This was an especially nice museum with a good interactive component that our kids would have loved when they were young. The building's garden is full of life size models of the various dinosaurs interspersed with plants and more of the flowers. .JPG)
Then we went to their Western Heritage musuem which was the type of museum I call "Grandmother's attic" which I love. There were all kinds of relics from the early pioneer days. After lunch we drove the 18 miles out to the Dinosaur national monument. The quarry wall which I was looking forward to seeing is closed because the building is falling down. Seems as 
though it was built without a good bedrock foundation on dirt which is the equivalent of kitty litter . The temporary visitor's center is spartan but they had a shuttle that took us up to the Dinosaur Discovery trail which is 1 and 3/4 of a mile long so we took our trusty walking sticks to walk up and down the parched terrain. Along some of the cliffs we saw a fossilized vertabrate and a large bone sticking out of the rock as well as smaller bones and fossils. There were also some petroglyhs in a washed out rock area. It was brutally sunny for most of our hike, although some clouds did try to tease us. Then we took a ranger guided bus tour to several places in the park: Swelter Shelter, a petroglyph site that lived up to its name, Chew Ranch, an overlook of a campground and pioneer ranch, and Split Mountain where the river flows through a canyon. We were very glad the bus had air conditioning.
though it was built without a good bedrock foundation on dirt which is the equivalent of kitty litter . The temporary visitor's center is spartan but they had a shuttle that took us up to the Dinosaur Discovery trail which is 1 and 3/4 of a mile long so we took our trusty walking sticks to walk up and down the parched terrain. Along some of the cliffs we saw a fossilized vertabrate and a large bone sticking out of the rock as well as smaller bones and fossils. There were also some petroglyhs in a washed out rock area. It was brutally sunny for most of our hike, although some clouds did try to tease us. Then we took a ranger guided bus tour to several places in the park: Swelter Shelter, a petroglyph site that lived up to its name, Chew Ranch, an overlook of a campground and pioneer ranch, and Split Mountain where the river flows through a canyon. We were very glad the bus had air conditioning. We enjoyed our sorjourn at Vernal very much. Now we head toward the cool! Ouray, here we come.
No comments:
Post a Comment