Lehman Caves

After leaving Yosemite, we headed for Great Basin National Park to check out Lehman (pronounced Lay-man) Caves, which is only one cave in spite of it's name. There are various legends surrounding how this cave was discovered by Absalom Lehman, back in 1881. Our favorite is the one that claims he was out riding when suddenly he dropped down into the cave. He was quick enough to lasso a tree and held on for four days until someone rescued him. He said the hardest part was keeping his legs around his horse so the horse didn't fall.

I had always had trouble remembering which were stalactites and which were stalagmites until Rob gave Matt his hint to help remember: stalactites has a "c", like ceiling, and stalagmites have a "g" like ground. So stalactites come down from the ceiling and stalagmites come up from the ground. Eventually, when they join, they become a column. Check out our Lehman caves album at http://picasaweb.google.com/debdistante/LehmanCaves for pictures of columns, new cave formations, some of the gorgeous colors, and the many shields which are found in the cave.

You can actually see a column on the left of this picture. To the right is cave bacon. Essentially, cave bacon is drapery that is marbled, like bacon. The guide we had for our tour was fabulous and gave us all kinds of information like this. Otherwise, I would have no idea why some of the formations would be called drapery and some cave bacon when they look much the same.

This shows an area with lots of color in the cave. Many of the formations are white or grayish but every now and then there would be a very colorful area such as this one. The color is caused by various minerals seeping in with the water.

This is one of the more exotic shield formations in the cave. It's called the "Angel Wing" because that is precisely what it looks like. Lehman Caves has more shield formations than any other cave. Our guide explained to us how the shields are formed and why it's so rare but that's been many days ago now and my brain is currently wiped out from hiking all day.

And for your last picture, here is Matt about as far into the cave as you can go. The path behind him used to lead into a part of the cave that used to be included but was determined to be unsafe back in the 80's. They are currently working on returning that portion of the cave to it's natural state, pulling out the paved walkways, cables, wiring, etc.

After our tour, we enjoyed a picnic in the national park and then headed for Delta, UT to dig for fossils.

A quick update from Estes Park, CO

Our internet connection is less than ideal here so I'm jumping ahead to today and a pictureless update.

Today was cool and overcast, looking like rain, so we opted to postpone our second day in Rocky Mountain National Park. Rob and Matt stayed in the RV park, did laundry, and played mini-golf while I caught the free shuttle into Estes Park to do a little shopping. On the way downtown, I saw a female elk, calming munching away on the side of the road.

I wandered the main street downtown, stopping in various shops along the way. I came away with a new Tilley hat (I cannot find my old one; I *think* it’s somewhere in the garage and that is a statement to strike fear into the heart of anyone who has seen our garage), a hiking pack, Mountaintrek sandals, a Life is Good shirt for my hubby, and, at long last, a pig for Lisa. I noticed that there was a theater downtown (turns out it’s historic, the longest consecutively operating theater west of the Mississippi) that was showing a 5:00 matinee of Kung Fu Panda so I called Rob and asked if he and Matt wanted to go.

The original plan was for me to catch the shuttle back, meet up with them, and then we’d all go downtown together. Since I had 40 minutes until the next shuttle and it was raining, I decided to grab a bite to eat. I made a good choice and the restaurant, Poppy’s, had a pork tenderloin on the menu. You cannot get a pork tenderloin sandwich in California. Oh, occasionally you might find something on the menu that *claims* to be a pork tenderloin but they lie. I made the waiter describe it for me before I ordered it even. And it was good. Not quite up to Iowa standards but good enough.

Unfortunately, the 2:00 shuttle was early and I missed it. So I called Rob again and he and Matt hopped on the shuttle here at the RV park at 2:21 and met up with me at 3:00 downtown. Matt was hungry so I took them to Poppy’s so they could eat. Then we wandered some more and Matt got a Life is Good ball cap (which he looks very cute in). Rob has been looking at trying a pair of Vibram Five Fingers for running and we actually found a store here that carries them. Unfortunately, they were completely out of his size in all the styles and said they wouldn’t be getting more of that size in until April. I have to admit, I find that odd.

We are now safely back at Winnie, deciding our plans for tomorrow. The forecast is for rain again tomorrow so we have to decide whether we’re going to brave the park in spite of it or head to Cheyenne a day early. I really want to try to see some big horn sheep and elk in the park. We only spent a few hours there yesterday, doing the Trail Ridge Road and one quick hike. We still need to explore the eastern half of the park.

Yosemite National Park

To start the second leg of what Rob has dubbed "The Great American Road Trip", we headed north to Yosemite. It turned out to be about 3 hours closer than I thought, making it a nice drive and someplace we are definitely looking forward to getting back to! In fact, we're planning on taking an entire week so that we can really enjoy the park and all it has to offer. Hopefully, some of the rest of the family will be able to join us next time.

Our first stop was at the southern edge of the park. We spent the night along the Merced River in the Wawona campground. As you can see here, Matt had a fabulous time playing in the river. He and a girl from another campsite explored the entire area in front of our site. You did have to watch out for snakes, though. As I was sitting on the rocks with some other women, one swam right for us.

Tuesday, we headed for Yosemite Village. They have a wonderful free shuttle service, so we parked in a day use parking lot (shuttle stop 11) for the day and caught the shuttle to explore. Stop 6 is the stop for Yosemite Falls, which is quite a nice trail. As we were walking on it towards the fall, we saw this deer, calmly eating ferns. Later, Rob spotted a bear and I was just quick enough to see it's hind end as it headed away from us. Sadly, Matt missed seeing it. Rob wins the award for spotting things, though, because he also spotted a snake, right at his feet, along this same trail. There are pictures of it, as well as lots more pics from Yosemite, at the Yosemite album here: http://picasaweb.google.com/debdistante/YosemiteNationalPark.

Isn't he handsome?

This is a nice view of both upper and lower Yosemite Falls. They were quite nice.

A shot of the entire family, at the bottom of Lower Yosemite Falls. After we finished exploring the village, we headed to the north end of the park and spent Tuesday night at Tuolumne Meadows campground. They do a nice campfire every night at 8 with a ranger program. We had a great time there. As I said, we can't wait to get back to Yosemite to explore it more fully!

Painted Desert

I found the colors in the Painted Desert to be absolutely breathtaking. Here is a selection of photos, the remainder of which can be seen with the Petrified Forest pictures here: http://picasaweb.google.com/debdistante/PetrifiedForestNationalPark.

Rob and I, outside the Painted Desert Inn.

I love the shadow to the left in this picture.

My handsome son, with the gorgeous desert behind him.

From the overlook at the historic Painted Desert Inn.

Another view.

Petrified Forest National Park

After our visit to the petroglyphs, our next stop was the Petrified Forest National Park. Lots of billboards for places to buy petrified wood were along the road, but none of them outdid what Rob and I have nicknamed “Tacky Town”, found at exit 303 off of I40. Not only will they give you a free piece of petrified wood, you can also spend hundreds of dollars for polished bookends or dinosaur fossils, you can also pay to feed ostriches, buy ostrich eggs, or spend $20 for the blown out shell of an ostrich egg. And if you’re in the market, this fine establishment is for sale!

There is definitely a lot to see as you drive through the park itself. We did several of the hikes that were available and they were definitely worth it, in spite of the 100 degree heat of the day. The petrified trees are gorgeous and you eventually come to the Painted Desert, which I’m making a separate post about since those pictures deserve their own.

Once living trees, the ones found here in the Petrified Forest have all been turned completely to stone. This group of pieces shows some of the colors found inside these amazing items.

What isn’t obvious from this picture is that this tree goes on off the left edge of the photo. It was *huge*. Most of the trees, when they fell, broke into somewhat even segments.

This beautiful fellow is a collared lizard. We saw several of these, perched on the edges of petrified tree, along different hiking trails. We didn’t seem to faze them much at all.

A fellow hiker was nice enough to take this picture of all three of us. The tree that we’re standing in front of was absolutely huge.

Behind Rob and Matt, you can see the stabilized remains of an ancient pueblo ruin. You can find more pictures of it and from our petrified forest adventure at http://picasaweb.google.com/debdistante/PetrifiedForestNationalPark.

Petroglyph National Monument

After leaving the Roswell area, we headed for Albuquerque for the night. As we approached our campground for the night, we saw signs for Petroglyph National Monument. Since we’d allowed 4 hours to explore Albuquerque, we decided that this would be the perfect place to spend our time. So after we’d packed up the next morning, we followed the signs and went exploring at Petroglyph National Monument.


The petroglyphs were made by ancient Indians, most likely Pueblo people, by chipping away at the volcanic rocks’ thin desert varnish to reveal the lighter gray beneath. While many symbols and animals are represented in these images, the actual meanings are lost with the people who carved them. I’m including a few images here and, if you’re interested, you can check more of them out at our Petroglyph National Monument album: http://picasaweb.google.com/debdistante/PetroglyphNationalMonument. All petroglyphs here are from the Boca Negra Canyon Trail.



These petroglyphs are clearly parrots or macaws. It is believed that these were valuable trade items, brought up from central America. Notice that the lower bird appears to be in a cage here.


There are many mask symbols, of which I believe this is one. Again, no one quite knows the meaning behind what these masks were used to represent.

Here, Matt and Seamus pose in front one of the petroglyphs, this one a human-like figure. We were careful to obey the rules and not touch any of the petroglyphs, because the oils in our hands can destroy them.

There are a number of 4-legged animals represented, such as this catlike drawing. Although it does appear to have a rather fierce mouth, so I’m not sure it would have been a domesticated type animal.

This is a yucca seed. It’s found in the same area as the macaw drawings are.

The Truth is Out There...

After experiencing the fantastic sight of hundreds of thousands of bats flying out of the natural entrance to Carlsbad Caverns at sunset, we headed to our campsite for the night. In spite of the fact that it was the Carlsbad KOA, it turned out to be close to an hour and a half away from the park. We decided, therefore, that rather than head back there in the morning, adding three hours of driving to our day, we’d save the cave for another trip.

The upside of this was that it gave us more time in Roswell (hey, we were driving right through! How could we not stop?) This turned out to be necessary since, rather than the 1 hour I’d allotted us, we ended up spending 4 hours there. Unbelievable.

First stop was the International UFO Museum. In flagrant disregard for the posted sign, Rob insisted on parking in this lot.

This lovely creature greeted us as we entered into the museum. Once there, we learned the complete history of the “Roswell Incident”, saw many photos, and read many signed affidavits. In spite of all of this, Rob still doesn’t believe in UFOs.

Matt, however, was quite intrigued by the recreation of the floating alien and insisted on having his picture taken with it.

I will admit that I expected much more of this than there actually appeared to be. There were a handful of cheesy, tacky gift shops but that was pretty much it. We were most disappointed not to find a UFO themed restaurant for lunch and ate at the much more mundane Billy Ray’s, which is a bar.

If I could have found one of these inflatable aliens, complete with ray gun, I totally would have bought it for Rob. Unfortunately, none of the tacky gift shops we explored seemed to have one for sale. As an interesting note, many of the stores were without much, if any, air conditioning and kept their lights turned way down. I found it odd.

And since our connection here at the Dinosaurland KOA is excellent, look for several posts to come!!