I'm in the tiny settlement of Blanding in southeast Utah and I made a quick
stop at the tourist office and the very helpful
staff there said to me don't bomb straight down to Monument
Valley with all the other tourists - turn off and do the natural bridges
national monument.
Now i'll admit that as it's not one of the famous national parks I didn't know
about this but this is a place that has three of
the world's largest natural stone bridges -
it has to be worth a detour!
We have our park passes, it was ten dollars per person,
and now we're on the nine mile loop road and this gives us access to various
viewpoints to see these incredible natural bridges. This is viewpoint number
one over the sipapu bridge.
Okay as I get closer here I'm beginning to think that this canyon might be a lot
lot deeper than I had first thought.
Oh wow, look at that! Now this is a very special place in the
daytime but they encourage you to come here at night
and camp because you'll see the night sky
as you've probably never seen it. It was designated the first
night sky park in the united states - a combination of the clear air and the
fact that there is no recognizable human habitation, no towns
really, for hundreds of miles around here, it is a wilderness.
The combination of the dry air and the hostile wind creates these incredibly
contorted desiccated shapes in the branches in the trees.
Coming up to another sheer drop now this is the kachina bridge
overlook
Tthere are trails down to all of the three bridges but we've only got time
for one today so we've chosen the owachomo bridge.
Before doing a trail you've got to have some trail mix although this
trail mix has got m&m's - only in America!
Should see the bridge soon...
Oh wow!
That was well worth it. Well that really is quite something. I'd
like to say personally a big thank you to the tourist officer
in Blanding who recommended this to us. More people should come here!
You can't help but be overawed by the incredibly powerful forces of nature
that have created this place and yet down here in the canyon it's
just it's so peaceful. It's just a beautiful place
I'm so pleased discovered it.
Well we left the park,I looked at the map it looked like quite an easy drive
south towards our hotel for the night at Monument Valley,
bombing along at 60 miles an hour, suddenly
there are some signs that appear that say switchbacks ahead -
5 miles an hour - dirt road. I thought that sounds like a bit of an exaggeration.
It wasn't because that road suddenly turned into this!
Well that was fun, apparently it was somewhere around here that they filmed
the final scene from Thelma and Louise where they
fly off a cliff, so I'm quite glad we decided not to do a remake!