Colorado National Monument - My World

With temperatures hovering just above freezing,
we left our home in Breckenridge to drive westward for about 200 miles.

 We traveled toward heat and high-desert landscapes.

The CO National Monument was named as a national park in 1911. 

Spectacular rock formations rise 2,000' above the valley floor. 

Remote canyons are formed by the erosion of rock over millions of years.

The sheer-walled canyons and massive sculptures are colored by iron and other minerals in the sedimentary rock.

In late summer, a few desert wildflowers are still blooming.

The cactus flowers had withered, but the tubes were bright red.

Hardy shrubs and bushes like sagebrush, rabbitbrush, and broom grow in rock seeps and along ditches.
Only the most hardy trees can survive the heat and lack of moisture.

The stormy skies produced a bit of rain that dried as soon as it hit the rocks.

A collared lizard winked at me as I climbed upward.

Flowers nodded in the shifting air currents along The Serpent's Trail.
We gained 700' of elevation and hiked 4 miles round-trip.
It's still dry and hot (80 degrees F) in the high-desert of the Colorado National Monument.
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