On our way from Las Vegas to Denver, we decided to take a few pitstops along Horseshoe Bend, Monument Valley, Durango, Silverton, and Ouray. I’d say my favorite part of the whole trip was camping out in Monument’s Valley KOA, over the clear starry sky.  Mind you, we were right next to the bathrooms and were dealing with a fly situation.  But we quickly forgot about that once we sat out looking at the beautiful stars. 

Horseshoe Bend

We arrived to Page, Arizona around 5PM – which gave us plenty of time to go eat some chicken at BirdHouse. Highly recommend this place, the staff were super nice and the food was amazing.  We then made our way to Horseshoe Bend around 6PM, which was still way too hot to be walking around.  From the parking lot, there’s a trail that takes you to the edge of Horseshoe Bend.  That walk took about 15-20 minutes, and then we quickly found a spot to hide from the sun until it was close to setting.  Once it did, we managed to climb up a small little mountain to enjoy the sunset from and take a few pictures.  I highly recommend going at sunset, it is absolutely beautiful. 

Monument Valley

The next morning, we made our way to Monument Valley which was about a 2-hour drive from Page.  We booked a tour through Monument Valley Tribal Tours with a Navajo guide that took us out to the backcountry of Monument Valley and explore places that only the Navajo are able to access. The tour guide shared stories about the rocks and played some music from their ancestors.  They also took us to a “Hogan,” a traditional dwelling of the Navajo, where a sweet lady shared stories about herself and how she used to live in one of these dwellings with her family.  She also showed us how they threaded blankets by hand, with the cotton that they gathered from sheep.  Note that to get down to some of these backcountry areas, you need a 4×4 car.  We saw several cars that weren’t 4×4 who were struggling to get their cars back up. 

We also managed to find some wild horses roaming around, which was very special.