The American West Part 12: Monument Valley

The area is part of the Colorado Plateau. The floor is largely siltstone or its sand deposited by the meandering rivers that carved the valley. The vivid red colour comes from iron oxide exposed in the weathered siltstone. The darker, blue-grey rocks in the valley get their colour from manganese oxide. Approaching from the north many of the famous landscape features reveal themselves.

West and East Mitten and Merrick Buttes at the start of the

Valley Drive.

Mitchell Mesa overlooks the Visitors Centre.

We arrived at the valley just before sunset.

Sentinel Mesa, Bear and Rabbit, King on his Throne and West Mitten Butte.

The view from John Ford’s Point at sunset.

Camel Butte with the shadows of the Three Sisters

The Three Sisters at sunset.

Where Forrest Gump stopped running.

After an overnight stop at Kayenta in Navajo country we continued south through the western edge of the Painted Desert.

As an avid reader of the Tony Hillerman series of books featuring the detectives Leaphorn and Chee I could not resist looking upon this as a scene from one of the stories.