August 14, 2022

August 14, 2022

After a late breakfast, we checked out of our hotel and drove an hour northeast of Flagstaff onto the Navajo Reservation. The landscape is filled with volcanic cinder cone mountains. Eventually we leave the pavement behind and travel eight plus miles along a very dusty washboard dirt road. We stop when we reach the Little Colorado River. One of the many lava flows in the distant past blocked the river here. The river breached the dam forming Grand Falls of Arizona. The Little Colorado River is very seasonal so it is not always so grand.

When we arrive, Aimee is surprised to see dozens of cars in the parking lot. As I open the door I hear a rushing sound. I think our timing is good. The heavy monsoon we are having is powering the waterfall. We are in awe. It is an extraordinary sight for the desert. Grand Falls is a series of cascades ending in several large plunges taller than Niagara. The water is thick with brown sediment giving it the well-deserved nickname of Chocolate Falls. Aimee and I hike around checking out the various vantage points.

From Grand Falls we backtrack towards Flagstaff and then turn north. In two hours we reach Page. After a leisurely lunch, we cross the Colorado River at the Glen Canyon Dam. We stop at the Wahweap Overlook to check out Lake Powell, or at least where it once was. Aimee asked where is the Lake. The water level has dropped so much it is almost back to being just the Colorado River again.

We continue west into Utah stopping briefly at the Grand Staircase National Monument Visitor Center in Big Water. While Aimee shops for a new backpack, I check out the latest dinosaur fossils found in this forbidding and remote landscape. Surprisingly the new Triceratops relatives sport horns that look amazingly like Buffalo. Paleontologists also think the 'skull frill' may have been very colorful.

We continue on to Kanab, UT. We are stuck in the car for awhile until the afternoon monsoon (and hail) subsides long enough I can dash inside the hotel.