Valley of Fire State Park
After visiting the Hoover Dam in December 2013 we took the Lakeshore road around Lake Mead for a scenic route to the Valley of Fire State Park about one hour north of Las Vegas. Covering 42,000 acres the park is famous for its red sandstone rock and the particular way light is reflected from it at certain times of the day.
We stopped along the roadway en route to the park to grab a few photos and stretch the legs a little once in a while, and on the occasion of the picture below I took a short walk while Sarah slept in the truck!!
We stopped along the roadway en route to the park to grab a few photos and stretch the legs a little once in a while, and on the occasion of the picture below I took a short walk while Sarah slept in the truck!!
I love the desert, the way such random colours of sandstone suddenly burst out between the grey and brown surroundings, or the incredible diversity of plants and animal life found scurrying to and fro in the shade, not to forget the myriad of lizards lounging on hot rocks in the winter sunshine. Everything about the desert is unexpected, surprising and most often beautiful.
It's hard to imagine what these bushes are even growing in, this is solid sandstone, in the desert with a pronounced peak so water will run off it in no time at all and yet here and there sit bushes that have found their place, I would love to see them in spring time rather than winter, but just to be here and see them at all is incredible.
Standing on the sandstone lump in glorious sunshine looking down through the long canyons and across the desert floor it's hard not to just keep on walking to the next hill, and the next.
Standing on the sandstone lump in glorious sunshine looking down through the long canyons and across the desert floor it's hard not to just keep on walking to the next hill, and the next.
Back to the car I wake Sarah as I enter, she thinks I've only been gone 2 minutes (and here was I feeling guilty and thinking I should hurry back) we go on a little further until I have to stop to grab a shot of the road itself with another huge mass of red sandstone bubbling out of the ground ahead.
Our next stop was a small oasis with huge palm trees where we, once again, found ourselves wandering off into the surrounding desert on a short pathway
The palms are clearly not struggling for water and a thin green strip gives away their supply, we decide to follow the narrow strip for a while and see where it goes to.
There is a small well trodden trail that wanders along beside a little stream, closer inspection reveals dozens of fish in the crystal clear water (which is surprisingly deep) Sarah insists she is about to catch one but after a considerable time I drag her away to the truck to continue the journey...she protests all the way that she was "about to catch a fish"....I'm not convinced.
The road turns into a narrow winding route as we arrive at the Valley of Fire State Park, the long shadows show that we may have got the timing just right.
The park has a number of large monolithic lumps of sandstone and as the sun begins to set it bursts through eroded chasms in the rocks bouncing from wall to wall to create something quite special.
It is easy to see where the name of the park came from, you would swear that there was a fire burning within this hole but it is simply the sun reflecting from one side of the rock onto another as it bounces light through the erosions.
It doesn't take much wandering around to find the rocks as they are all over, but the sun moves quickly so there is a need to 'find the holes' pretty quickly. One actually died away as I photographed it!!
Some of the holes are big enough to climb into though it looks very hot inside, it's actually no hotter than the surrounding area but your brain won't believe you.
There are other colours of rock within the park and the peaks and troughs allow shadows to protect the fires in some areas and snuff out the fires in others.
Even in the shade the wonderful colours still draw your eye to the weathered stone as you try not to run past the shadows to find another 'fire'.
This image shows clearly how the bounce light works. The sun on the far left of frame behind the orange rock is striking the face of the rock on the right hand side before the bounce light projects the wonderful warm light back onto the rock opposite.
You can then close in and isolate the 'fire' as you wish, it really is an interesting and quite stunning phenomenon
Even higher up after scrambling up a large rock I found this little fireplace through a tight crevice in the rock, who would argue if you told them this was the embers of a coal fire
After only one and a half hours the light was fading fast as Sarah snapped this shot of me chasing one more image before we leave
In truth the light was gone and we reluctantly headed back to the truck and out toward the main interstate to Las Vegas, we did get the benefit of a fantastic 'dark skies' section before we reached the highway where the sky was filled with stars as only a desert sky can be...Sarah couldn't believe just how many there were.
The Valley of Fire is one of those wonderful little roadside parks that the US has so many of, people pass by everyday without even thinking of visiting....in this case (as in most of these little parks across the US) they are really missing something.