| Sunset crater is one of those quick little trips out of Flagstaff, maybe 15 miles or so. It's a little eerie, something like the moon with trees. Actually the Apollo astronauts trained near sunset crater because it's suppose to be the place on earth that is most like the moon. It's where they practiced driving their lunar vehicle.
It's actually a very new volcano only about 1000 years old (that is but a micro second on the geological time table). Interestingly, there are many other cinder cone type volcanos in the same general area. |
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Sunset Crater National Park Scenic Views |
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| Here is something that does a pretty good job of showing the landscape near the crater. As you can see there is this sort of mixture of cinders and lava flows.
One nice thing is that there are a few short easy hiking trails so the kids can run off that bottled up energy from the trip from Los Angeles, Albuquerque or wherever.... Runtime 6:09 |
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| Wupatki is a fascinating look into a not so ancient Indian culture. It is included in your "price of admission" to Sunset crater (or vice versa). One could easily see all three of these places in the same day. And, if you push it, probably still have time to shoot up to Page or even the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. Make sure you have your motel reservations or camping plans made though. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
Blowhole at Wupatki Ruins, AZ |
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| Wupatki is a fairly thought provoking place as far as Indian ruins go. And here is just one example of that.
This pretty lady was kind enough to use her long hair to demonstrate the blowhole phenomenon for us. Runtime :22 |
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Wupatki 2007 |
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| A quick little tour among the ruins at Wupatki. There are quite a few smaller ones in addition to the two main ones show here.
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Walnut Canyon |
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| Walnut Canyon is hardly even outside of Flagstaff just off I-40 heading east.
As you see in this video, these Indians were cave dwellers. I have never quite understood how you keep your kids away from playing near the edge? Walk softly and pay attention. Runtime 1:52 |
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| Here are your links to the official web sites:
Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument |
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