WRESTLING ALLIGATORS

WHEW!!! 

I am tired!!!!

I can’t remember when…or if…it’s ever taken me so very long to finish one tiny painting. 

But, finally, I think it’s done!

And I’m worn out.

I thought  it was going to be an easy painting to do.

Ha!

To begin with, it’s a very special painting of and for a very special person.

You can read all about the trip to the Grand Canyon with grandson, Michael here. 

I didn’t take into account the fact that this is basically an aerial perspective…not a viewpoint I’m familiar with.

It needs to have an enormous sense of distance. 

It must ‘read’ Grand Canyon, in spite of the haziness which calls for very little detail in those far off buttes. 

And even though the figure out on that rock is tiny, it needed to be the very reason for the painting.

Since there really is a very small amount of detail, what in the heck took me so long, you might ask.

Well….’cause I forgot. 

I forgot to keep things simple. 

I forgot to remember that I was NOT trying to duplicate a reference photo. 

I forgot to sneak up on some very subtle value and color changes instead of going too far too fast with them.

I forgot to let my left brain lead the way and got way too right brained in the process.

By the time I got my head screwed on right again, I’d been at it for a very, VERY long time.  Once I accomplished that, things sure did go a lot faster!

I am grateful for that!

STANDING AMAZED

8 X 10

LEFTOVERS-MORE TRIP PICTURES

Today's post is a collection of pictures that didn't make it onto my original posts about our trip.  I had to draw a line somewhere....even though it was really hard to do.

This is the picture on a sign at the Grand Canyon of one of the original trails down the canyon side. 
No thanks!

I saw this gnarly old tree trunk lying on the ground and just had to take its' picture.  It's either a smiling snowman or the Pillsbury Doughboy.  LOL

I love this one of Michael.

I have no idea what kind of tree this is, but it sure was pretty!

This is the excursion train which runs from Williams, Arizona to the Grand Canyon.

Bluebird Flour.

This is THE flour that is used to make Navajo Fry Bread and all their other tortilla type breads.

Isn't the bag beautiful?

One of my Navajo family made this apron for me...and a matching one for 'S'...from the flour bags.  Every single stitch is done by hand!  I treasure it!

Hopi House, at the rim of the Grand Canyon is a beautiful building.  Inside, you will find innumerable ways to spend a great deal of money!

The name, Hopi House, should give you a clue that not only the Navajo people have lived...and still do...in this area.  Within the boundaries of the Navajo reservation, is a small reservation of the Hopi people.

I found these 'faces' on a trail at Canyon de Chelly.

These are examples of really old hogans. The front door always faces East.

I'm including this one just because...just because I love it!

And this one to show how very green parts of this country can be.

And this one, at Slide Rock State Park, because I got lucky enough to get it.

And this one, to show how our Grand Canyon day started.  It was so cold and of course, we did NOT have the right clothing for such weather.

One evening, I saw this through the windshield.  Sunset is a magical time.

How can I tell  you what an impact these places made on me.  They are inside my soul, holding on tenaciously.  And for that, I am GRATEFUL.

NAVAJO COUNTRY AND MONUMENT VALLEY

It was so hard to leave The Grand Canyon.  Michael really loved it there and I think he would have been quite happy if we had just driven away and left him.  But we assured him that where we were going next would be just as incredible...but in a different way.

We were heading to Indian country.  Navajo country.  Dineh-land.  The place where John Ford filmed so many of those old western movies.  The place where all the Indians were Apaches and Saguaro Cactus grew...both absolutely false! 

Leaving The Grand Canyon, we drove northeast through some of The Painted Desert.  We needed to be in Kayenta, Arizona by bedtime, so unfortunately, there was no time to stop for picture taking.  These few were taken as we zoomed down the highway so they're really blurry.  Sorry.  And, of course, we were still plagued by the overcast sky which just turned everything grey.  Trust me when I tell  you that in the right conditions, this area is full of beautiful pastel colors...lavender, orange, yellow, russet, blue...you name it, it's there!

This whole region is all about geology....everywhere you look there are interesting, beautiful and sometimes, downright comical rock formations.

This is one of my all-time favorites.

You can drive a car between these huge feet....hopefully that gives you an idea of their size.

I love to see them because they are fascinating and also because it means I am getting closer to Kayenta, where my Navajo 'family' lives.  Unfortunately, this trip we didn't get to see them. 

Kayenta sits at the bottom of another incredible formation called "TOES." 

This is the view from our motel room, the next morning after we arrived.

I took this photo many years ago as my friends and I were hiking up TOES.  All those 'sand dunes' are NOT...they are solid sandstone rock.

This is the pretty little town of Kayenta from TOES looking toward BLACK MESA.  Again, this picture was taken many years ago, but I just had to show you how pretty it is.

Driving out of Kayenta, you will see this.

I found this website when I was looking up the correct name for this formation...Agathla.

It looks like an excellent site if you are at all interested in the Navajo people.

http://www.lapahie.com/El_Capitan_info.cfm

Before long, you start getting hints of what is to come......

I might as well tell you right now that I think this is going to turn into multiple posts.  I cannot, for the life of me, decide which of my hundreds of pictures, I can possibly leave out of this post!  I'll start with these.

From the moment we entered the park, this is about all I saw of Michael.

Our rental car had a sunroof and Michael made good use of it!  But his bum was black and blue after several hours driving on the bumpy, rutted dirt roads through Monument Valley.

Most of these formations have names.  Here are "Mittens." 

I could have spent hours looking at the gigantic cliff faces.  I saw so many pieces of abstrac art in them.

This is the only hogan in Monument Valley you are allowed to take pictures of. I'm sure it was built, primarily for the tourists, but it is a good representation of an old style hogan. There are several private homes of Navajo people throughout the park. It is requested that photos not be taken of their homes. I'm sure many people do it anyway. But I see it as blatant disrespect and I won't be a part of that.

You can rent horses if you want.........

and ride through this beautiful landscape..........

Or you can do it in a pick-up truck............

Or you can do it in a fire engine red rental car, like we did.

I'm flat worn out from picking and choosing between all these pictures.  I think I'll just have to do it again tomorrow.  Would that be ok with you?

Happy Trails to you...till we meet again.

I am so GRATEFUL to Dineh for sharing their beautiful home land with us!

THE GRAND CANYON

It is impossible to convey, either with words or with pictures, what you feel when you first see this place.  The much over-used 'awesome', truly fits.  It takes your breath. It makes you shake your head in disbelief.  There is no way to wrap your brain around the enormity and the majesty of this particular space on our planet.

Michael's look, when he got his first glimpse, says it all.

It is wide.

It is deep.

It is amazing!

A few facts.

The park contains over one million acres.

It is from 5000 to 6000 feet from the rim to the river.

Aproximately 5 million people visit each year.

The oldest rocks in the canyon date back 2000 million years.

The canyon inself, however, is ONLY 5 or 6 million years old.

For more information, visit,

http://www.nps.gov/grca/index.htm

It is hard not to offer to take pictures for other people so their entire family can be included. Michael became the photographer for several families at this look out point. Somehow, we failed to get the favor returned. We simply forgot to ask.

We had so much fun with this group from South Korea.

And I couldn't resist this face!

Unbelievably, you can, in many places get right to the edge of what would be a deadly fall.

And we saw more than a few people doing what I would consider really stupid behaviour!

Yep...that guy is standing about 2 feet from the edge.

But, the winner of stupid human of the year has to go to this mother. You can't see him in the photo, but she has her small child standing right in front of her on that rock. A strong wind could have blown him right off.

Of course, Michael had to scare us just a little, too. Although he assures me that he really was on a safe path.

It looks like he's walking off into nothing, doesn't it?

I swear he's enjoying scaring me!

I especially loved the many gnarly old trees.

We didn't see much wild life.  Just this ground squirrel

this raven

and several California Condors which have been successfully introduced into the canyon.

One of my favorite spots was this place.

It's called The Watchtower.  I love the building and the story behind it.

http://www.scienceviews.com/parks/watchtower.html

Here is where Michael just HAD to scare Grandma one more time by going way out there on that little bitty point...far, far away!

Here's the picture he took looking back toward us.

He said there are a few places on this trail that are extremely narrow with a pretty steep drop on either side.

It's so hard to decide which pictures to include and which ones to leave out.  I took, literally, hundreds, although between the heavily overcast skies and smoke in the atmosphere from a nearby controlled burn, my pictures didn't turn out really good.  Still...........I just have to show you a few more.......

I am so grateful to the Creator of The Grand Canyon and so grateful that we got to share this trip with our Michael!