They were giants......

7:08 am - Sunday - May 31st - Jensen, UT - 59° F, 72% humidity, wind 6 mph out of the northwest.......high cloudiness today with a forecast high here in Jensen of 87° F, but we will not be here to experience that.....we roll our wheels in two hours northward to Rock Springs, WY.  On this day in 2014 I was riding the 'Flume Trail' with  Michelle and Mark Douglas......

View of Sand Harbor from the 'Flume Trail'

Back in September of 2012 we spent a few days camping at Flaming Gorge in Wyoming.  I saw on our map that Dinosaur National Monument was about 70 miles south of our position, and wanted to see it, but we were headed east on I-80 at the time to work at Amazon in Campbellsville, KY for the first time and a round trip drive of over 150 miles was not in the cards, so we said to ourselves 'next time' we are in the area we'll see it......next time did not come for 7.5 years.  A couple of weeks ago I saw our travel path would take us by this national monument again, so we decided to make it happen.

We are staying at Outlaw Trail RV Park, which is across the street from the road which takes you to the western entrance of this very large park.  When we go sightseeing with Glenn and Laureen we almost always ride in their Honda Element, mostly because the ingress and egress from their vehicle is easier on our aging bodies than the VW.  We left in their Element just before 10 am to enter the park......

....as is the case with all the National Parks, and Monuments we have visited thus far on our summer travels the visitor center was closed at Dinosaur National Monument, along with its main attraction, Quarry Exhibit Hall, where you are able to view many fossilized dinosaur bones still embedded in the rock quarry where they were originally found......

.....nevertheless, we decided to take the hike up to Quarry Hall to attempt to view some of the fossilized bones through the tinted windows.  Along this 1.5 mile long trail you can view some petroglyphs......

.......the temp was in the high 80's Saturday making hiking in the intense direct sunlight interesting to say the least.  After about 30 minutes we reached Quarry Hall and attempted to take some photographs through the darkly tinted windows where others have been attempting to do the same thing prior to our arrival....the windows were full of hand prints, and smudges making it difficult, but we did the best we could.....

 Quarry Exhibit Hall

.....between TLE and I we managed to get a few fuzzy pictures.  I wish we could have gone inside.....

 

 
.....the view from Quarry Hall was spectacular, and we spent about 20 minutes resting in the shade before beginning the walk back to the Honda via the paved road, which is currently gated to keep people from making the drive up the hill.....

 'Elephant Toes'

 The trail up to Quarry Hall

 TLE got this picture of a large fossilized dinosaur bone near the hiking path to Quarry Hall

.....once back at the car we continued our tour of Dinosaur National Monument finding more petroglyphs just a short walk from the road....

....about 8 miles into our drive we came to the end of the road at Miss Josie's homestead cabin.....

Miss Josie's homestead cabin

....signage told us that Miss Josie homesteaded this property in 1914 at the age of 40 and lived there 50 years.....no electricity, no plumbing, dirt floors.  A very solitary, basic existence....she must have loved it....

.....we availed ourselves of a picnic table located on Miss Josie's property to eat lunches prepared by TLE and Laureen.  About this time it began to cloud over, the air began to cool noticeably, and by the time we finished it had begun to rain.......it was time to seek the shelter of the Element once again.

We arrived home around 1:30 pm....time for a nap, right?  We had a fun time touring Dinosaur National Monument, but were disappointed in not being able to enter Quarry Exhibit Hall.....that is the main attraction at Dinosaur National Monument, so perhaps a return visit at some time in the future is warranted.  All that being said we had fun with Glenn and Laureen talking and laughing, and just hanging out together.  As the saying goes "Time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time...."

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