north central Arizona

So what is THE major attraction/landmark/etc. in north central AZ?? Of course, the Grand Canyon. The G.C. is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide and a mile deep. The rock at the bottom is nearly 2 BILLION years old. The natural processes that created this amazing landscape are many: tectonic collision, land mass being pulled apart, sediment accumulation, rising land, then water erosion. wow. Beyond the technical aspect, it's just plain gorgeous.

On the same busy day that we went to the G.C., we also visited Wupatki National Monument. Yep, more ruins. LOL This one was kind of cool - it looked a bit like a castle. There are only a few sites in the NM that are open to the public; the rest are closed for the protection of the fragile resources.

And then one more thing that same day - we drove through Sunset Crater Volcano NM. To me the most fascinating part was how some parts of the cinder cones have vegetation on them, and other parts do not. This first picture really shows that distinctly; you can also see the ripples in the black cinder dunes.

This picture shows the namesake of this National Monument: Sunset Crater Volcano.