Dinosaur National Monument

Monday, July 13, 2015

Day 97

We left Colorado Springs by 6 am to miss the Denver rush hour and were able to skirt around Denver without difficulty. We had a beautiful drive through and over the Rocky Mountains on our way across magnificent Colorado.

 We have still not decided our route home but did decide to stop at Dinosaur National Monument and camp there. We are so happy we did. This is another fabulous spot in our National Park system.

Visitor Center

 The park has its beginnings due to the discovery of paleontologist Earl Douglass of dinosaur fossils in 1909 for the Carnegie Museum. In 1915 the Carnegie Quarry's world-class bones of late-Jurassic dinosaurs were protected in 80-acre Dinosaur National Monument. Today, the park is 210,000 acres and includes the scenic and historic Green and wild Yampa rivers, canyons, archeological sites, petroglyphs and diverse plant and animal life. Evidence shows that people have lived in this area off and on for thousands of years. This is the only national park area set up to protect a historic dinosaur quarry. About 95% of the park has been recommended for designation as wilderness and is managed as such until Congress acts on the recommendation. The Yampa River is the only naturally flowing river in the entire Colorado River system. We set up camp at the Green River campground. We were surprised how many open places were available in this pretty campground but realize this park is out of the way. 

Green River Campground

 We then returned to the visitor center and took the shuttle up to the quarry to see first hand the dinosaur fossils.

Shuttle to Dinosaur Quarrry

Dinosaur National Monument Dinosaur Quarry

There are 1500 bones in this wall of rock that is surrounded by the modern building to protect them.

Vast wall of dinosaur bones for all to see!

 There is also other dinosaur displays including one of the largest intact skulls ever uncovered of an allosaurus. 

Allosaurus skull

It is amazing that all these bones are in one place. The explanation is that there was a severe drought which caused the death of many dinosaurs and when the waters returned the bones were washed into one area which was covered by silt and eventually layers were built over them, causing the dinosaur logjam that we witness at the quarry. We returned to the visitor center and looked at the displays and then returned to camp, ate dinner and took a walk along the Green River, saw horses across the river at the Chew Ranch whom were original homesteaders here.

Green River

Paleontologist Earl Douglass and his first discovery

 The dark clouds were gathering and as we returned to camp the wind and rain started just before we could settle into our cozy tent for the evening.