Valley of Fire State Park, NV

#109 (November 17, 2022): The state of Utah has instilled a love of sandstone, slot canyons, and exploring in us all. Utah is an endless wonderland to explore, and we all agree that it is one of our favorite states. Although it is bittersweet to leave, we are looking forward to more desert adventures next door in Nevada.

We drove 2.5 hours west to the Valley of Fire State Park in Moapa Valley, Nevada. This is a bit of a gamble for us because it’s the first campground that we have visited that is on a first come, first serve basis; we don’t have a reservation here. Although we were relieved to find some open camping spots when we arrived, unfortunately none of the available spots had full hookups. Rats! We had really hoped to have a full-hookup site after being electric only for the past 6 nights.

We parked in an open site and got out of the truck to stretch our legs as we decided: should we stay, or should we go? Not only do we not have water or sewer hookups here, we also don’t have electric either. This would be dry camping, which we’ve only done once in Crater Lake; dry camping is definitely more of a logistical challenge for us (i.e. keeping the fridge from spoiling and phones charged, and the limited wifi for Chris’ work, most specifically). Thankfully, it’s November, a mild season, so AC, fans, and heaters aren’t as imperative as it would be otherwise.

Meanwhile, for the kids, there was nothing to decide; it was love at first sight! They climbed out of the truck and instantly ran to the all-natural sandstone playground that surrounded us. For kids who love forts andlove to climb, this place is Heaven on earth! Most campsites were nestled near and separated by large sandstone outcrops (try to picture huge oddly misshaped sandstone mounds or beehives everywhere you look). Thanks to erosion, all the outcrops had small tafoni holes perfect for rock climbing, as well as large holes, windows, and alcoves perfect for forts. Seeing their excitement and delight, and the kids begging to stay (of course! LOL!), we agreed to give it at least one night. Thankfully, we had enough gasoline to run our generator for a few hours to keep our food in the fridge from spoiling until tomorrow when we could decide what to do next.

After setting up camp, we drove to the visitor center for maps and info before embarking on the 2-mile Fire Wave and Seven Wonders loop trail through Pink / Pastel Canyon. This trail is closed June 1 – September 30 because of the dangerously high temperatures during that season. Thankfully for us, today is a beautiful clear-sky, mild fall day—perfect for a hike! Woo-hoo! This place is hard to describe; it is unlike anything else we’ve seen. There is so much COLOR here, which is not typically the case for a desert! God must have been extra playful when He created this place, or maybe He had a brand-new watercolor set He wanted to try out! For the next hour and a half, it was like walking through a God-made taffy shop or perhaps ice cream shop or Candyland, I can’t decide, and the colors and flavors change continually everywhere you look. One minute you are walking through peaches and cream, then strawberries and cream, then strawberry-banana, then banana, then blueberry swirl, blackberry swirl, raspberry sherbet, then salted caramel. Seriously, everywhere you look, it’s colorful petrified taffy or ice cream (hence the name Pastel Canyon). And the sand, it looks like God sprinkled Pixie Sticks on the ground. Pictures don’t do this place justice! Fire Wave, an orange-crème swirl rock, looks like a wave of orange fire. Valley of Fire State Park is such a unique colorful piece of art by the Master Artist and a sweet feast for the eyes. How fun it is to be a “kid” in God’s candy shop!

That night we ate Little Debbie Christmas Tree Cake ice cream and Peppermint Cookies N Cream ice cream; both reminded us of today’s swirly landscape! Love it! Oh, and the fun new animals of today that we saw for the first time were a roadrunner and a kangaroo rat!

#110 (November 18, 2022): The kids awoke with one mission on their minds: to seek out and find a fort to declare their own! Once a fort, or perhaps mansion would be a better word, was chosen, they went to work assigning each room a purpose. Afterward, they were ready to give tours to whoever was willing to climb up into their fort. As Emily, Neil, and Bethany sat at the top of Neil’s fort (the tallest one of all, of course!), Emily was surprised when her cellphone rang! We are in the middle of nowhere, with ZERO cell phone reception, or so we thought! We were up so high that she was able to talk to her mom for several minutes sitting at the top of Neil’s fort! LOL! Go figure!

Besides the fact that we have zero hookups here, this place is awesome!! It’s got to be one of the most fun campgrounds we’ve experienced. It’s unlike any other! Thus, we have decided to drive into town to get more gasoline for the generator, so that we can stay two more nights. Yay!!! On our drive out of the park on Valley of Fire Road, we stopped and saw some of the other cool geologic wonders that are found here in Nevada’s first and largest state park, such as Arch Rock, Atlatl Rock (petroglyphs), petrified logs, Seven Sisters, some historic cabins, and Elephant Rock (not as cool as Arches’ Parade of Elephants but still cool!).

The kids were eager to get back to our campsite so that they could continue to play “forts” the rest of the afternoon. The sun sets early here (about 4:30 pm) so the days are short. That night, we sampled some prickly pear cactus candies and prickly pear ghost pepper jelly that we had bought at the visitor center. Both were delicious! With no lights or wifi, we read Journey to the Center of the Earth by lantern light.