DINOSAUR NATIONAL MONUMENT

Just seven miles north of the town of Jensen lies the Dinosaur National Monument. Since our lives our completely intwined with Dinosaurs we thought it would be a good stop for the Wood Clan. 

You may recall that we have stopped at several Dinosaur areas in previous years - The Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Thermopolis and Dinosaur World last fall in Kentucky. At five, we find that Cassia doesn't appreciate the dinosaur bones as much and so in the end, this trip to the monument impressed Derek and I much more.

The entry fee is $10 for a week.

The road in - you can just see the Visitor Center on the far right.

At least there is one dinosaur with it's 'skin on'. 

Since we arrived later in the day we headed straight for the Visitor Center.

A nice, although not very large, center. 

The store took up much of the space and of course grabbed Cassia's attention. When she wanted a souvenir at the Fossil Butte Monument we convinced her that there would be something much better at the Dinosaur Monument. Now that we were here - and looked at the crazy high prices of the plastic dinosaurs and stuffed animals - we had to bribe convince her that we would find a whole box of dinosaurs and stuffed animals for her somewhere else. Boy - it's a slippery slope isn't it? If you can believe - the large dinosaurs there are $34.99 - ouch!

Then off to the campground.

The River Trail begins at the far end of the campground - Cas and I went for an evening stroll after dinner.

Looking back at the Green River Campground where we spent the night.

Our campsite - #54 - for a reasonable $12. It was actually fairly busy with almost all of the spaces filled. The campground offers just restrooms - sadly, no showers.

Since we arrived so late in the day to the Monument - we headed out Sunday morning to explore a little.

There are a few trails along the main road - we opted for the Desert Voices - the trailhead begins at the Split Mountain Group Campground.

A very nice trail although somewhat strenuous with a climb about half way through. The placard noted that it would take between 1 and 2 hours and yup - that's what it takes.

Lots of information about the area along the way.

What the blog has been missing thus far are the Wood Clan silhouette photos - right?

And then the path is down.

Following our trail hike we went down to look at the boat launch - lots of river rafting here.

Although is was a short visit, we enjoyed Dinosaur National Monument for the scenery and the hike. We opted out of visiting the quarry figuring it would be too busy - but I wish now that we had just to see it.

Our timing was a bit off - we were there on the 11th - if we had arrived on the 14th the Green River Campground would have been closed and we could have camped at the Split Mountain Campground for free, because the water would have been turned off. While I was doing my research I found this out but had dates of early October - I thought for sure we would be late enough. It would have been nice to stay for a few days.

Instead, we carried on into Colorado to the town of Dinosaur. We spent the afternoon at the Colorado Welcome Center there - the weather wasn't so great - a bit of rain and even some hail while we were there. It was a good chance to have lunch, pick up some info, charge our laptop in the center and visit the playground across the street.

We left to continue south at around 3:30pm - our next destination Grand Junction wasn't far. Those really really great shots next.

Teresa

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