The very wide reaching views of canyon after canyon stretching for many miles

give this part of the national park its name of 'Island in the Sky'

Before driving back to Moab (and another meal at the Diner),

we visit Dead Horse :Point State Park for its view of the Colorado River.

Day 15 takes us from Moab to Cortez, Colorado - a drive of 194-miles.

Our route includes the Needles section of Canyonlands National Park

Newspaper Rock in Canyonlands National Park, where petroglyphs have been created over

a thousand years by scratching through the desert varnish to expose the lighter rock beneath

Our exploration of The Needles section of Canyonlands is made by a series of walks on short designated trails

The 'Needles' that give this section of the park its name, can only be viewed from a distance,

as can the Abajo Mountains, en route to Cortez for two nights at the Anasazi Motor Inn.

Day 16 is spent exploring the Mesa Verde National Park which contains the most notable and best preserved pre-Columbian cliff dwellings in the United States,

occupied by the Anasazi Indians for about 700 years up to the 1200s

Our exploration of the Cliff Palace (the largest dwelling of its kind in the world), located on the Chapin Mesa, requires the ascent of two ladders and the need to squeeze through a narrow doorway