Arizona Fly Drive Destination
Painted Desert & Petrified Forest

Area navigation				Map of location The map to the right is interactive. Hold your mouse pointer over the highlighted places and they will be identified. Some of the places shown have a web page and can be accessed by clicking on them.

The painted desert and petrified forest are well worth a visit if you have not been to this part of the world before. The landscape is .... er .... alien is the best way I can think of descibing it. The petrified forest is not a load of stone trees standing up. It is however, an area full of remarkably preserved stone tree trunks laying around. Stop in at the visitor centre and have a walk along the trail behind to see these fossils up close and to get a feel for the atmosphere of the place.

The logs strewn about in this picture are actually rock. Its very hard to believe until you get up close and touch them.

Drive north through this wierd landscape to the I 40 and cross over into the painted desert. By sheer good luck we arrived there late in the afternoon and we subsequently read that the colours are more vivid early or late in the day. Its still difficult to believe that the dramatic pink colours are natural and not painted on as early explorers thought when they named it.