The second largest canyon in the US

We drove into Palo Duro Canyon today which was a nice, easy drive from Tucumcari except for the last couple of miles. After checking in at the state park office, we drove a curvy little road until we hit a sign which shows a truck silhouette going STRAIGHT DOWN and the words 10% grade on it. I had heard of this earlier, but also heard it was well worth going through. No one exaggerated the descent. Hairpin curves, two lanes, and a loooonnnng way down

Going down!

. Jeff drove it beautifully, but I was certainly using my imaginary controls on the right side.

Look how high that is!

Before we even got set up at our campsite, we heard the gobble, gobble of wild turkeys who were walking right through the campsite.

Wild turkeys right outside our door

I took Madison for a walk through the campground and right in front of us was a big Tom with all his feathers puffed out. Unfortunately, I didn't have my camera at that time, but here's a close-up of one in our camp

Thanksgiving dinner on the hoof!

.

Twice a day, deer would come out to feed.

. They were very used to people and didn't even seem bothered with Madison

, although she was very bothered with them. All she wanted to do was play.

The canyon is really beautiful. Instead of camping of the rim as you do in Grand Canyon, here you are in the canyon itself. The walls rise red and rough right next to the campsites.

Canyon view from the campground

The weather was really nice most of the time we were there - cool and crisp in the evening and warm during the day. We had rain while we were there which was the first time we had been in significant rain for months. Only toward the last of our stay did we start to feel the oncoming heat.

The views of the canyon are really lovely from the visitor's center.

Overview of Palo Duro

. Here you can see an area they call Spanish skirts

Known as the Spanish Skirts

, and anyone can see why it is called that. It is reminiscent of Grand Canyon although more rustic. I would love to see the stage show "Texas" that is performed there with the canyon as a backdrop, but I wouldn't want to be there in the Texas summer heat. We could actually hear the cast rehearsing in the evening from our campsite.

We drove into the town of Canyon a couple of times while we were at Palo Duro. We found a couple of great places to eat if you're ever at Palo Duro. One is a hamburger place called Hil's Hamburgers which was next to the laundromat we used. Really good hamburgers and onion rings. The other is called Feldman's Wrong Way Diner - dedicated to anyone who has made a wrong turn in life. The place is decorated with movie posters from movies like "Lost Horizons", "Lost in Space", "The Lost Battalion" - you get the idea. I had chicken fried steak - which was REAL Texas chicken fried steak and very good.

Jeff's episode of Boston Legal aired while we were there, in fact, the day we arrived. We were having trouble with the satellite dish and were concerned that we weren't going to get it for a while. We were finally able to bring in 119, but we never were able to get 110 to come in. Luckily for us, Boston Legal is on 119.

Jeff got a really good close-up in Boston Legal although slightly out of focus, but it is easy to recognize him even without pausing the DVR. It's his swan song for background acting as his feet really don't allow him to do the constant walking and standing required.

We totally enjoyed our stay in Palo Duro. The grade going out was not really as scary as the one going down, but make sure you've got a nice powerful tow vehicle.

May 14, 2008

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