Visit to the Navajo Reservation in March 2013

White House Ruins from the south rim overlook in Canyon de Chelly.

For our Anniversary, my wife Lori and I travelled to the Navajo Reservation for 3 days of sightseeing and photography.  Our first destination was Canyon de Chelly and we stayed at the Quality Inn in Chinle.  The accommodations were excellent but I will warn you that if you stay out for the sunset your dinner dining opportunities are extremely limited.  The restaurants close very early in Chinle.  Next time we are bringing food with us.  We took a very informative jeep tour with Francene from Canyon de Chelly Tours and were able to photograph many of the ruins and petroglyphs as close as you can legally get.  Bring at least a 200 mm lens if you want to get nice close shots of the pictographs and petroglyphs.  Unfortunately it was cloudy most of the time so we could not get the colors we had hoped for.  Plus it was a little early and the Cottonwoods had not leafed out yet in Mid March.  My next trip will be in October-November when the Cottonwoods are in fall colors.

From Chinle we went to Kayenta and met with our guide Shea from Monument Valley Safaris.  Shea was excellent and we really enjoyed the campout and scenery from Hunt's Mesa.  From there you can see all of the spires located in the Navajo's tribal park.  Unfortunately there were 30 mph gusts and our visibility was limited.  We enjoyed it enough and the scenery was good enough I hope to get back soon and after a few more trips offer a photo workshop with Monument Valley Safaris.  (http://monumentvalleysafari.com)

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