March 17th-19th

Petrified Forest National Park

Petrified Forest, Arizona

About 4 hours East of Phoenix is Petrified Forest National Park. A small park where ancient geological formations reside.

After a brief stop in Pheonix where we were able to meet up with our friend, Kirsten, and celebrate St. Patricks day we were off to the lesser known Petrified Forest National Park. The drive to get there was lovely. Through the mountains of the Tonto National Forest, and the high plains of Arizona.

The best shot we got of the Tonto National Forest.

We were so high in elevation we even ran into a little snow.

Petrified Forest National Park

The entrance sign has petrified wood on display. Can you tell how excited we are?

Tucked in the Eastern side of Arizona, between the Navajo and Apache reservations, is the “smallish” park, Petrified Forest NP. At an elevation of 5,000 feet, it is a dramatically different landscape compared to the tall cactus filled Southern portion of Arizona. The landscape here is short sage bushes, prairie grasses, and colorful badland like hill formations. The two days we visited the weather was chilly and windy, but still, this park is beautiful, colorful, and we learned a ton about geology and what a petrified forest is. Also, we found the park very easy to explore. With two entrances on opposite sides of the park and a 26mile long road connecting the two sides, it is a very easy park to navigate. Along the drive are several established hiking trails and scenic viewpoints to break up the drive. One to two days is all you really need to see everything. We saw most of everything in less than two days.

Map courtesy of Petrified Forest National Park.

Entering through the Northern entrance of the park first takes you through the painted desert. Several overlooks offer dramatic views of this parks “badlands”.

It was super windy on our first day in the park!

An old hotel and restaurant have been preserved as a museum.

They kept the old kitchen in tack. We loved the colors.

Awesome Navajo inspired windows. This place was First Peoples appropriation at its finest… :/

A lot of petroglyphs have been discovered in the park. This one looks like a cat.

The old dining hall.

Enjoying the view out of the wind and cold.

But let’s be honest, the view is best out on the edge of the cliffs.

Southern Side of the Park.

Where the rainbow petrified wood can be found.

A large and very colorful chunk of petrified wood. This is along the Giant Logs trail near the Visitor Center.

Now we will give our best attempt at explaining what petrified wood is and how it is formed.

Approximately 225 million years ago, during the Late Triassic era, the continents were apart of the supercontinent known as Pangea. The area we now know as Northern Arizona looked like a swamp filled with lots of trees and water.

Imagine this. Lots of plants and trees with lots of rivers, marshes, and perhaps swamps. copyright: techtimes.com

Trees along the banks of these rivers would occasionally fall in as erosion occurred. These trees would flow down the river, get stuck in an area with several other trees and debris, and then get buried under lots and lots of sediments and mud. Now, in a relatively quick time period, perhaps as little as a decade, preservation occurred. As these trees decayed, water would wash away the tree particles and minerals would be deposited in its place. Then with millions of years of time and pressure from being buried, these minerals stayed in place and compacted. Then with millions of more years of time passing the tectonic plates shifted and a desert landscape took over. Erosion eventually washed away the top layers of dirt until these preserved pieces of wood became exposed again. There is a lot of technical details we probably missed, but the main thing to know is that when looking at the petrified wood there are no tree particles that exist anymore. What we see is the imprint of these ancient trees preserved through minerals. What is cool about this parks petrified trees is that there are so many different types of minerals in these fossils they have created into a “rainbow” of colors.

Check out these links for more information.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petrified_wood

https://geology.com/stories/13/petrified-wood/

Some of the pieces are huge. These trees are so well preserved one can count the rings.

Selfie!

See the knots and bark of the tree?

Colorful detail.

Even though the fossils easily break apart, there are a few trees that are intact enough to show how tall they once were.

Another detail. So pretty!

Camrin poses with a large stump.

The end of this trail leads to an overlook of the badlands.

Shadow puppets!

Yay!

This trail leads back to the Visitor Center near the South Entrance.

Inside the visitor center is more information on the park and dinosaur displays. While the petrified wood is the main fossil to be found here, several animal fossils have also been discovered.

Agate House and Long Logs Trail

Near the south side’s visitor center is the trailhead that leads to a remade pueblo ruin.

Wheelchair accessible. Nice!

These structures were made by members of the CCC work program, but they are accurate renditions of the homes First Nation people lived in. Using adobe clay and petrified wood a sturdy structure could be made.

Inside the structure.

Art!

After seeing the structure the trail then connects to a loop where more petrified wood can be seen.

“This place is so cool!!”

“This is cool!”

“And this is cool!”

Notice the hills in the background? The minerals here affect the colors of the Badlands too. The northern section of the park where we started has lots of red in the hills from iron deposits. The hills in the southern part have lots of blues and purples.

Some of the details have been so well preserved scientists have been able to identify about dozen tree species throughout the park.

The trail winds through a couple of Badland features.

Noticed this in the parking lot. The sun can be very harsh and direct in the southwest. Makes perfect shadows.

Crystal Forest

Next Trail! Crystal Forest Trail!

These signs are everywhere in the park. Rangers take wood theft very seriously. They even occasionally search peoples cars as they exit the park.

This was probably the longest mostly intact tree we saw.

This is how the trail got named, Crystal Forest. The minerals in this area formed small crystals in the petrified wood.

These logs can really sparkle in the sunlight.

Chunks of petrified wood dot the landscape.

Agate Bridge Trail

A short trail leads to overlooks and the trail’s namesake.

Sun shelter on the way to the bridge.

Old photographs show tourists walking across this bridge, but even with the cement reinforcement, walking across the bridge is now strictly prohibited.

Blue Mesa Trail

A short mile-long loop trail through colorful badland features.

To be honest. Wh thought they looked more purple in color.

Puerco Pueblo Trail

Information boards offer more details on the people who lived here.

Only the foundation of this home still exists. Park officials believe there are still many more dwellings and artifacts that have yet to be discovered.

Several petroglyphs nearby.

Route 66

The famous Route 66 that spanned from Chicago to L.A. once crossed through the middle of the park. The old road is gone, but one rusted out old car and a row of telephone poles still remain.

1932 Studebaker.

Americana.

That’s it for our time inside the park. We only needed about a day and a half to see just about everything. Tourists are welcome to explore off trail here, but with the weather being a bit chilly we were ready to head out and warm up in the Jeep.

The Greatest Gem Shop Ever

Nerd Alert!

On our way to our campsite, we passed by Jim Gary’s Petrified Wood Co. We’re not gonna lie, we love gem shops. Camrin even likes to collect rocks and gems. When we saw this place we just had to stop. It’s huge!! And the whole shop is surrounded by mountains of gems.

Minerals, rocks, gems, and fossils from all over the world for sale.

The back corner of the shop even has a little museum with priceless gems and artifacts on display.

There is even a tacky coy fish pond inside the shop.

And dinosaur sculptures that chased Camrin in the parking lot.

We probably spent a good two hours at this place looking at everything. There are a ton of gem shops in the area, but this one was by far the largest.

Our Private Canyon Campsite

Within 15 minutes of the Southern Park entrance is some BLM land where we camped for two nights. Our campsite was on the rim of this small canyon and the Little Colorado River. An awesome free campsite and no one else in sight!