On The Road Again - well, not really: Corners of four states

October 19th, 2008
Farmington, NM to Monument Valley, UT

Clear and cool
175.1 miles

Very pretty drive today. A real switch – the roads improved entering Arizona!

There has been lots of turmoil in the geological life of this land – gorgeous!

Had to make the short side trip to the Four Corners Monument, where Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona meet. Played tourist and put a foot or hand in all four states at one time! Silly, but fun!

Red Mesa surprised me with it’s very nice lands and housing developments.

Then the road curls up just crossing into Utah and enters the Monument Valley area.

Oh my gawd, this area is even more spectacular in person than on the big screen. Because of course you know that several hundred movies have used this

location as the backdrop for the shoot – be it in westerns with John Wayne, cartoons such as Chip n' Dale's Rescue Rangers or science fiction movies such as Back to the Future III; television appearances as in MacGyver; and video games such as the Playstation 3 video game Motorstorm.

Monument Valley is located on the southern border of Utah with northern Arizona near the Four Corners area, within the range of the Navajo Nation Reservation.

The Navajo name for the valley is Tsé Bii' Ndzisgaii meaning Valley of the Rocks. The land is holy to the Navajo, and you can feel it.

The drive in was gorgeous, but nothing compared to the late afternoon tour I took with a native guide for sunset colors - it was just awesome! I took over 750 pictures – that was overkill, certainly, but the bouncing of the little open bus made picture taking a challenge, and I wanted to be sure I took some good shots.