Monument Valley

After a very short rain storm, the campground was totally flooded with red water and mud.  It was streaming down the road, flowerbeds and through the campsite!  We decided to wait to set up the trailer and went to the Monument Valley visitor centre, which was about 10 minutes away.  This is a brand new centre, with some good information, a gift shop, and a restaurant with an absolutely amazing view of the valley.  It was a little freaky as there was a lightning storm going on all around us.  The viewing area was outside, but sometimes we could feel the hair on the back of our neck stand up when the lightning cracked - it was that close!!  So we decided to go in and look at the exhibits.  The rock formations on the left and center in the picture with David and the kids are called the Mittens (if you double click on the photo it should enlarge it).  

We had a snack on the patio of the restaurant - this had to be the best view we have EVER had while eating an order of nachos!!!  We could see most of the valley out in front of us, and watch the tiny little cars drive through the dirt road of the valley trail (which we were not able to do of course because of the darn trailer!!)

This area is very sacred to the Navajo Indians, and the calm, quiet beauty of the land is very spiritual in it's own way.  Again, I think we were very lucky to visit there during a rain storm as that added a whole other dimension to the 

landscape.