Nevada’s Valley of the Fire State Park

150 million years ago, during the time of the dinosaurs, these amazing red sandstone formations were formed from shifting sand dunes. With a complex uplifting and faulting in the region, followed with an extensive amount of erosion, we have today one of the most incredibly beautiful regions we have seen on our trip. The landscape of huge red rocks spread out in a variety of formations is really almost too much for the senses to take in. Our campground was nestled right in among the rocks.

We spent the next two days exploring the rugged area of about 42,000 acres, driving from view point to view point in the Prius and taking several nice little hikes to see the magnificent structures up close and personal. The many unique whittled rocks give your imagination a good run for its money, “there’s an elephant; oh look I see pig; that looks like an old panel truck crashing on to the road.” We also saw several places where the ancient residents had left petroglyphs etched on rocks. Our camp site was very relaxing; we spent both evenings out sitting in our lounge chairs enjoying the nature show. Monday night was a pretty good lightening review and Tuesday night we watched a clear sky and saw quite a few stars.