Road Trip 2025: Day 7

I had another odd dream. I was planning to go abroad. Where exactly? I don’t know. Either my dream wasn’t clear or I don’t remember. The purpose of the trip was a year long training. Again, I am not certain what the training was for, but I was excited about the prospect of living elsewhere for a while. In the middle of getting ready to go, G3 reminded me of a Boy Scout commitment. I grabbed my car keys and drove him to another Boy Scout leader’s house. When we arrived, I got a call saying my training was canceled.

We didn’t set an alarm last night. We figured we needed a more relaxing morning. I woke up at seven. G3 and Kati were still asleep, so I left them in their sleeping bags and took a short walk along the river. I couldn’t go too far because there was no path and various long grasses and vegetation covered the bank. Still, it was a pleasant walk in the silence and stillness of the morning.

The family woke up when I got back to the site. We broke camp and ate breakfast. Again, I loved the quiet, the fact that it felt like we were alone. A chipmunk came to keep us company and tried to steal Kati’s Cheerios. He made me think of my fur babies back home and the way they walk on our dinning room table while we are eating. I really miss them.

During the Jurassic Period, dinosaurs roamed what is now the National Monument. There was also a river that cut through the territory. However, a drought settled over the land, killing many of the dinosaurs. When the rains returned, they carried the bodies into the riverbed. There were so many carcasses, the larger ones essentially created a logjam. The smaller ones were swept away. When these larger bones were covered by the soft silty sediment, they became trapped. Over time, new layers formed, pressing down on the sediment and turning it stone. Then,

mountains formed around the same time as the Rockies. As they formed, the fossils were pressed upward, and in some cases became exposed on the rock face.

On August 17, 1909, Earl Douglass, a paleontologist from the Carnegie Museum in Pittsburgh, discovered dinosaur fossils on the mountains. The first fossils he found were eight tailbones belonging to an Apatosaurus. Over time, other paleontologists collected fossils from nearly 400 different dinosaurs. Douglass’ dream had been that the government would preserve one of the rock faces embedded with fossils so the public could see the fossils, learn about them, and develop an appreciation for the dinosaurs that once roamed the earth. His dream was realized, thought he didn’t live to see it.

A mile from the visitors center is the dinosaur quarry. A rock face with many exposed fossils is enclosed in a temperature controlled building. Visitors are not only able to see them, they are encouraged to touch a few. If only we had been able to afford to bring G3 there when he was three and obsessed with dinosaurs, he would have loved it. At fifteen, I’m not even sure he was intrigued, but I was. I am glad we decided to stop in for a visit. Running my fingers over the bones of an animal that lived more than one hundred million years ago was pretty awesome.

More awesome were the petroglyphs. My cousin used to live in Utah, and periodically, while exploring parts of the state, she would post pictures of petroglyphs on Facebook. Every time she posted, I wanted to be there and see them in person. Today, I got to do just that, and I was so excited, I took a picture and messaged it to her. The designs look very much like a child’s drawings. They are simple and one dimensional, but it’s fascinating to look at artwork that was done centuries ago. Work that managed to survive the ages. It makes me wonder about the artists. Who were they? Why did they feel compelled to create? What influenced their designs? And, what sort of life did they live?

Both petroglyphs and pictographs are in the park. Petroglyphs are carvings on stone. An outer, darker layer of stone is chipped away to reveal the lighter color stone underneath. A hammer stone was one of the tools used by indigenous people to design petroglyphs. Pictographs are paintings on stone. Various materials, such as charcoal, were used for ‘paint’. Hematite, which is rich in iron, creates a deep red color that lasts longer than pigments made from other materials. Both the petroglyphs and pictographs were designed by indigenous people dating back about one thousand years.  However, archeologists have discovered stone tools—such as drills and scrappers—in the park dating back as far as nine thousand years.

Before leaving we took a short hike. We parked at the Sound of Silence trailhead and walked in the ninety degree heat. It’s the desert so there was virtually no shade and the sun sucked the moisture from our bodies. We did not complete the entire loop. We walked for about twenty minutes before turning around so that we wouldn’t melt.

When we left the park, we were hungry,

so we stopped at Pizza Hut for a late lunch. The waiter must have been stoned. He moved so slowly—I’ve never seen anyone take so long to write an order—and looked half confused. When he served us our food, he gave us no silverware. I went up to the counter and asked for utensils. He walked to the back and returned with plastic forks and an explanation, “Our silver keeps going missing.” I wonder if he’s selling it for his drugs.

We drove four hours to Salt Lake City this afternoon. Our plan was to camp at Antelope Island, but they are doing renovations. As a result, the showers are not working. Normally, that would not be an issue, however, we are planning to meet up with friends tomorrow night and we don’t want to be unwashed and in clothes that haven’t been changed in five days. Therefore, we found a cheap hotel for the next couple of nights. Once we checked in, we headed to Culver’s for dinner.

What better way to end a day that started at Dinosaur National Monument than with a trip to the movies to see Jurassic World Rebirth. I think G3 summed it up best, “It was a fun movie, not a good movie.” I like Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, but I did not care for her in Jurassic World. My absolute favorite character was Dolores, the little baby dinosaur. She reminded me of Dante, which made me wish he was here so that he could cuddle up with me tonight.

I took a shower. I couldn’t wait until the morning. It feels so good to be clean.