Colorado National Monument - Saddlehorn Campground

When planning this trip, spur of the moment that it was, I knew that finding sites in cool places would be difficult because so many folks are out here doing the same thing. 

In some places we found ourselves quite a bit further from our intended 'site' or featured destination.  It's all been good, just a few more travel miles than we'd anticipated.  Our big surprise came when trying to book something near Fruita or Grand Junction, our stop after camping with Gail and Dave at Gore Mountain Pass.

 

Balanced rock formation

Quite of few of the state parks, or federal lands now require on-line booking.  Like any new system, the learning curve can be a bit steep: reading the reservation rules, the park map, the site map, how to work the dates to get what you want,  working within the systems time limits, it just takes time and patience to get through it. 

There are several examples of amazing engineering feats- this gap is one!

We got lucky with Saddlehorn Campground as I had NO idea it was within the Colorado National Monument!  We entered the park from Fruita, after filling with free water at the Welcome Center in town.   After entering the park, you go up, and I mean UP!  There are at least 4 tunnels, that were all carved out by hand. 10'6" on the sides and 16' in the middle for clearance.  We're only 10', but we drove the middle anyway!

When the colors and the light are too harsh.... try black and white!

The campground is on top of the mesa.  You are close to the rock formations and structures, and the sights are pretty amazing.

We had 3 nights here and explored all of the canyons, formations and any other area that looked cool.

One of the rock formations and the town of Fruita in the background.

I wanted to do a sunrise shoot before we left and luckily the best spot, in my opinion, was right around the corner from our campsite, Monument Valley.

Daybreak at Monument Valley, Colorado National Monument 

Sunrise over half of Monument Valley