Road Trip, Part Two: Detours & Cinder Cones

On the second morning of our trip, it was up and on the road early before the desert got too horrible. It was a gorgeous drive through the early morning. We had flipped a coin on which direction to go out of the park - we could go north, east, and south to Kingman, or south, east & north to Kingman. We opted for the former, which worked beautifully until we got to the intersection where we were to head south, and the road was blocked by a policeman. "Indefinitely - could be hours" he said. Sigh. So we turned north instead, and took the looooong way around by Hoover Dam.

Hoover Dam - boy is that a giant non-sequitur in the middle of a long desert drive! You're driving along, there's a small town, the traffic gets a little heavier, you can see Lake Mead in the distance... then suddenly it's all pylons & cement & giant construction machinery & homeland security & traffic & more cement & more pylons & weird art-deco sculptures & a giant half finished bridge and it's like you're on another planet. Ugh! We stopped in a parking lot long enough to hop out - lordy it was HOT - take a picture of Carson - and keep going.

After that the trip went more smoothly, and by mid-afternoon we were in Flagstaff. We decided to fit in Sunset Crater before heading to my friends' house where we were to stay. The weather had cooled, and there were rain showers, which made the colors of the lava & cinder cones really beautiful. At Sunset Crater we walked around - did the little path by the lava flow and grooved on the weird shapes of the lava and on the black black cinders next to the deep red cinders, piled high in smooth mounds.

It was interesting to read in the visitor center about how they used to allow folks to hike the cinder cone, until they realized how much impact the hikers were having. My parents visited there in the late '50s, and were able to leap down the cone in the knee-deep cinders. Carson and I could only admire from a distance, but I can sure understand why they had to change the rules. At the time they closed the trail it had gotten thigh-deep in places.

After the crater we headed to our friends' house, where there was hot dinner waiting, and horses & chickens for Carson to help feed, and a cozy bed for the night. Not to mention the pleasure of seeing dear friends again!