Grand Canyon and Monument Valley (Day 11)

  This tassel-eared squirrel was curious about our campsite.

 But we bored her so she ran up a tree.

 The Sinking Ship

 More totems at the Tusyan Ruins.

 These ruins were totally unreconstructed.

 Goodbye, Grand Canyon.

Melissa happened to see a reference in our atlas to a site with dinosaur tracks that we'd be soon going past. Its sign on the highway was literally a spray-painted piece of plywood propped on a fence post and a folding chair, so we were a little skeptical. My skepticism abated when the guy said admission was "a donation", and went away entirely when I saw the tracks. They were too imperfect to be fake. 

Our guide said that was a claw from a theropod, Utahraptor maybe, but apparently it's some fish's gill plate.

He also said this was a corprolite (dung), but it's probably just some natural concretion.
The place is called the Moenkopi Dinosaur Tracks. As noted, our guide had some facts screwed up (he also had animals living together that were separated by tens or even hundreds of millions of years), but then again he's self-taught. I'm mostly glad he and the other caretakers respect the place and keep it open to visitors. We would highly recommend stopping if you're ever out that way. This is a good, sober review.

 You can barely see it, but I'm pretty sure that's a gustnado just right of center there.

 Elephants Feet, another Krazy Kat reference.

Snow fell on us twice on our drive: on the first day in Southern Montana and Northeast Idaho, and this day, between Elephants Feet and Marsh Pass.

 The sky cleared around Kayenta, giving us our first glimpses of Monument Valley.

 

The West Mitten and the East Mitten

Goodbye, Arizona, see you again sometime maybe.

The approach down to the San Juan River at Mexican Hat has the steepest grade I've ever seen signed.

 That's the Mexican Hat itself.

 Sitting Hen Butte and Rooster Butte

The Sun had long set by the time the winding, confusing road delivered us to the campground at Hovenweep, where we enjoyed camp stove mac-and-cheese.

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Ruins of North-Central Arizona (Day 10)

This jaunty Baja Super Beetle greeted us on a corner in Cottonwood, which it turns out is the Southern terminus of the Sedona weirdness.

Tuzigoot National Monument wasn't on our radar until we saw it on a map of hikes around Dead Horse Ranch State Park, where we'd camped the night before. It was well worth it. The ruins themselves have been partially reconstructed, which is slightly lame, but the artifacts are incredible. I thought these stick figures were toys, but it turns out they were probably totems.

Two intriguing facts about that ochre bowl: it was likely made by an adult but the figures were painted by a younger person, and the figures (there's a fourth one you can't see) are macaws.
Pre-Columbian natives of the Southwest established trade routes with the Aztec empire to the South, and there is indisputable evidence that some of that trade consisted in live scarlet and military macaws in all four Four Corners states: Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado*. Triple-exclamation point fascinating.

We chatted with a nice couple and their '78 in a grocery store parking lot. They've been living in it for several months. Hey guys! If you see this, get your name on this list. 

Next stop, Montezuma Castle National Monument.

Good ol' Ludwig, still pushing us along, every day.

Kavalierly kruising the konfines of Kokonino Kounty (the Kountry's 2nd-largest), klimbing hills and koasting past kliffs.

That's Humphreys Peak (Hopi: Aaloosaktukwi), Arizona's highest.

Still climbing, into Flagstaff.

And then past Flagstaff. After this it was down, though not much, to the South Rim, where we camped for the night.

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*The article at the cite doesn't mention Colorado or military macaws, but the materials at Hovenweep indicated that there were macaws in Colorado as well. Displays at a few sites we visited, including Tuzigoot and Montezuma Castle, mentioned military macaws in addition to scarlet macaws.