Gold Butte National Monument - Day 1

Next up for our Southern Nevada trip was Gold Butte National Monument. Created in 2016, this monument protects 300,000 acres of beautiful desert scenery, with several native rock art sites that were of particular interest to us. More friends of ours, Bob and Tiana, joined at this point for the rest of the week-long trip. 

Our first day in the monument had us at an eroded sandstone feature known as Little Finland (in this case "Fin" are rock fins in the sandstone). What fun we had wandering around for several hours. 

 

Afterward, we drove a short distance away to another trail along a sand dune to a small rock art site. 

Many, many more petroglyphs and beautiful scenery would follow the next day.

Southern Nevada Exploring

We spent a week recently exploring some new areas for us in Southern Nevada. Our friend BJ joined us for the week. The first three days we explored an area outside Valley of Fire State Park. The area is younger aztec sandstone, covered with older Dolostone limestone (caused by the collision of the Pacific Plate and the North American Plate). The beautiful red sandstone is exposed in places with amazing erosion features. We could have spent the whole week just poking around this area...

Day 1

Day 2

Day 3