Valley of Fire

One big reason for us to stay at Lake Mead National Recreation Area was to visit Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada, which we did today.  The landscapes are spectacular and surpassed our hopes and expectations.

We did five hikes.  Here are some photos from each of them.

WHITE DOMES

The White Domes hike is a short loop hike that showcases white, pink and red sandstone formations.  It was the location for perhaps a dozen major motion pictures, including "Star Trek: Generations."  The variety is magnificent:

Here are some of the most typical "domes" to be seen on the hike:

 The hike includes a surprise slot canyon as well:
 

We saw some great arch formations, including this one --

-- and this one: 

 We like to call this formation, "The Turtle":

 The shapes went on and on:

FIRE WAVE

We moved on to another popular hike, "Fire Wave," which is also of moderate length.  It requires hiking about a mile to get to the wave formation.  Here, David has climbed the last stretch and is excited to see the Fire Wave just on the other side.  That's a very small David at the top of the red rock slope:

 Once we arrived at the wave, we saw lots of awesome, colorful formations with bands of multicolored sandstone:

On our hike back, we stumbled on this very large lizard, chasing his paramour.  When we got close, she skittered off, but he chose to freeze and hope that we wouldn't attack him.  Well, the only attack was photographic, so he wasn't harmed.  He ran off without injury and had the opportunity to court again:

 
BUSHWHACK AT PARKING LOT #2

Two parking areas are offered in the park to visitors who want to simply wander through this fantastical landscape.  We chose one of the parking lots and headed off into the wilderness to see that we could see.  Here are the results:

Below, Kathy seems to have been inspired by this little sandstone formation to point the way back to our Jeep: 

FIRE CANYON OVERLOOK

Our fourth hike was to the Fire Canyon overlook.  The hike was marked by immense cliffs of red sandstone, but these were often counterpoised with delicate green plants:

About 1.75 miles in, we came to a point where the Fire Canyon dropped off steeply, giving us a dramatic view of this wild landscape:

Above us, unearthly formations continued to stand guard.  This was only one of many:

PETROGLYPH CANYON 

Our final hike was a short one into Petroglyph Canyon, where thousands of ancient petroglyphs stand open for inspection.  This rock formation bore more than we could count:

Here are some petroglyphs we found on the rock.  They look like two humans and two rectangular beings dancing hand in hand:

The rock also contained more "traditional" petroglyphs, carved into the desert varnish covering the sandstone rockface:

Our visit to Valley of Fire turned out to be longer and much more exhausting than we had expected.  We hiked around for almost 5 hours, with a little time off for lunch and drives between hikes.  We trudged through deep sand and up steep stone.  The weather was sunny and hot.  So, by the time we got back to our campground, we were ready for a little rest and refreshments.  Got to rest up for tomorrow's adventure!