HMS Beangle

After a quick overnight at Wasatch Mountains State Park, we wended our way to Dinosaur National Monument outside of Jensen, Utah. Straddling two states, the most visited part, the covered dinosaur quarry exhibit, is in Utah. But there is so much more than just the Fossil Wall to see.

We barely touched even the Utah side of things. We saw the Fossil Wall, of course, and a few Native American pictographs and petroglyphs.

We visited the rough log cabin inhabited by a remarkable settler, Josie Morris, who raised cattle and other farm animals, grew fruits and vegetables, and maintained a sizable ranch all on her own from the age of 40 to 90 — from 1914 until 1964 — with none of the modern conveniences that we’re used to: water, electrical, sewer, or gas/propane. Afterwards, we hiked into the two box canyons that acted as her cattle pens, and later along the Green River.

We’ve rested and relaxed a lot, figured out how our trailer’s systems and setups work, and plotted out things to make our future travel time easier and more efficient.

The landscape so far has been stunning. We often just stop and gawk. Around each turn of the road there seems to be different and ever more magnificent rock formations. One by the entrance looks like huge undulating snake, another by the cabin resembles a giant tortoise. They range from deep reds, fiery oranges, turmeric yellows, and brilliant whites to charcoal grey. They appear to change depending on the cloud cover, the time of day, and the presence of rain. And it’s all tied together by the Green and Yampa Rivers. How could we not stop and marvel?

We haven’t even scratched the surface of (petroglyphed?) all that there is to see here. We’d like to come back for a longer dive into Dinosaur National Monument someday.

Unfortunately we don’t have the time to give the Colorado portion a visit this week. I’m especially sad about missing that section as that’s the portion, per an executive order, is projected to be opened up for mineral and gas exploitation. If what happened at Bears Ears NM last time around is any indicator, the delicate landscape at DNM will be ravaged. There are plant species there that grow nowhere else on earth. I hope they haven’t been drilled and mined to oblivion by the time we can get back here.

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