This morning we continued our journey to Page, Arizona but we had a couple of stops before we reached our destination. Our first stop was my pick, Montezuma Castle National Monument. Montezuma Castle was built by the Sinagua people, it is the main structure and it comprises of five stories and twenty rooms, and was built over the course of three centuries. Montezuma Castle was built about 90 feet up a sheer limestone cliff, facing Beaver Creek. Why build a castle so far up a cliff wall? It is believed it was to protect from natural disasters like flooding of the Beaver Creek. The cliff side has a set of well preserved cliff dwellings that were built approximately 1100 and 1425 AD. It is an amazing site to see and it is located near the town of Camp Verde, Arizona.
Montezuma Castle
A little closer
I took out my 500mm lens to get some closer shots of some of the features of the castle
More dwellings on the cliff side
These magnificent trees were on the grounds at the monument. It is the Arizona Sycamore, it sheds it's bark and leaves colours of white, brown and green - great camouflage tree. It towers over 80 feet, need plenty of water to survive and has large leaves.
From Montezuma Castle we drove to Craig's choice, Meteor Crater. To tell you the truth I was also excited to see this crater as we had seen it on TV and we never thought we would see it in person. The meteor hit the earth about 50,000 years ago at a speed of 26,000 miles per hour with a force greater than 20 million tons of TNT. The floor of the crater is 550 feet deep which is equivalent to a 60 story building. It is over 4,000 feet across and 2.4 miles in circumference. Everywhere you went there were signs stating Experience the Impact so that is why I called this blog entry this. I thought it was fitting for both sights today as they were amazing.
Cool!
The entrance to the meteor and museum
A bit heavy to pick up
WOW!
My wide angle lens couldn't capture the full crater
If you refer to the previous picture you will see something white at the bottom.
I took out my 500mm lens to get a closer look - old drilling machine and a couple of wells
If you look close you will see a US Flag and an astronaut who they say is 6 feet tall
This is one the left hand side of the rim and it is as big as a house
Craig was pretty excited to see this crater
Me and the crater
First thing you see when you enter the museum
Craig at ground zero
ok they had a photo booth in the museum
We made it safely to Page and our hotel faces a canyon, we were too late to really catch the sunset but I did walk around a bit on the grounds to take some pics. Great views so far and I can't wait to see more tomorrow. Speaking of tomorrow, we have two tours booked for the Antelope Canyon where we will do the upper canyon first and then the lower one. Really excited! After our tours we make the long drive back to Phoenix where we will leave Arizona on Wednesday.
The next four pics are taken from the car while driving to Page
Such beauty
Love this foot bridge
The front entrance still had flowers growing
Not sure what these tiny white flowers were but they were pretty
Roses were still blooming
Prickly Pear Cactus
At dinner I had a Prickly Margarita made from the fruit of this cactus
Good place to read a book
Good night from Page, Arizona
Talk soon!
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