Moonrise from our motor home looking out across the prairie at PEFO. The sights are dramatic when the sun’s angle is low, right after sundown, and now when the moon is full.

We are settling in, getting into a rhythm here at PEFO, and starting to learn all about petrified wood, petroglyphs, geology, and more modern culture: Route 66. Tonight marks our 5^th straight day of “work,” and after tomorrow we will have a 2-day break. Clarifying what is expected of us, we are only required to work 32 hours and that can be split between us. Of course we plan to work 32 hours each. Because of coming off the shutdown and some personnel changes, extra help was needed. This has led us to be working 10 out of the first 12 days we will be here. Things should get back to normal next week. A new volunteer couple will be arriving the first of November which should help take the pressure off of us. Anyway, we don’t mind working more than what we bargained for as long as we know the reason why and we can contribute. So far, we are having the time of our lives, excited by this place and the new knowledge we are cramming into our old heads, and the feeling that we have that we are really valued here.

 There is a visitor center at the north entrance to PEFO, a 26-mile road that runs through the heart of the park and gives access to a sample of everything the park has to offer, and then another visitor center and museum at the end of the road at the south entrance. However, the most interesting historical building is the Painted Desert Inn (PDI). It was first built in the 1920’s before PEFO included the land where PDI is located. It was built out of petrified wood and served as a place for travelers on Route 66 to eat and lay over. The building deteriorated over time, and in the 1930’s when it was incorporated into the park it was rebuilt by the CCC. It was not used after the 1950’s and NPS decided to demolition it. Fortunately they changed their minds and it survived to look as it does above. The interior houses lots of memorabilia from the Route 66 days in the 1940’s and 50’s when the Harvey Girls served the customers. Shannon has had a number of shifts working at the PDI and is becoming a PDI specialist.

PEFO contains an enormous amount of petroglyphs. The figures were scratched on rocks covered with “desert varnish.”Removal of the varnish exposes the lighter rock colors to produce visible figures and designs. There is lots of debate as to the meaning of the petroglyphs. This is one of my favorites. Hopis interpret this by saying the artist was a product of the crane and frog clans, and the drawing symbolizes a coming together of the two clans. If that is the correct interpretation, it seems to me that this could be the earliest mother-in-law joke. The Zunis interpret the petroglyph as a giant bird that snatches bad children, a story from their culture. Whatever the interpretation, it’s about as much bird watching as we get around here which is a switch from other places where we have volunteered. And that’s the whole point of moving around and experience new things. PEFO offers so much variety; new things seem to appear around each bend in the road.