Road Trip — Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada

Posted by Karen on 02-Oct-2007

(213 photos)

I leave Overton and head south towards the Valley of Fire State Park through a corner of the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. You instantly know when you’ve reached the Valley of Fire, the landscape turns into this gorgeous red sandstone and it’s very peaceful. I stop by the visitor center and ask about the camping area and then I head over there to select a spot and I found a nice one at the Arches Campground. After lunch, I head back out to begin exploring this entrancing park. The Natural Arch Rock, Atlatl Rock and it’s petroglyphs, the Visitor Center and it’s movie and exhibits about the geology and history of the park. My next stop is Petroglyph Canyon, where I decided to take off the leg brace and decided to take up a little bit of hiking again. This little quarter mile canyon slot contained lots of petroglyphs on the walls and at the end of the canyon was where Mouse, a renegade Indian hid out because water would get trapped in a basin and sustain him during the dry periods. I spent sunset out on the rocks looking over the Rainbow Vista and watched the sunset create deep purples and reds across the rocks.