Travels With Abs - Wednesday July 1st - "Tracking the Dinosaurs"

Wednesday morning started off with a trip to the Snow Canyon sand dunes to hunt for "dinosaur eggs." Darrell McMahon, our education director, presented information on dune formation. His use of foam props and photos, provided good visuals and encouraged the children to pay attention.

We examined tracks and track ways as we headed out over the dunes. It had been a busy place overnite.

The children had been in instructed in proper exploration techniques for paleontologists, but excitement reigned during the actual "dig" and everyone scrambled.

After much excitement and scurrying into the sand like little crabs, the groups unearthed their finds. Abs' group found several "Cantaloupeasaurus eggs."

Andrew Milner joined the group again and we headed to a special area designated "No Trespassing." Unfortunately, some people can't read and they had taken a backhoe into the area a few months earlier. Large slabs of terrain containing dinosaur tracks had been removed. Some were found being sold on e-bay. One of the most unfortunate parts of the theft is the loss of information. Many artifacts which could be priceless are rendered almost worthless by their removal from the site without proper documentation.
I was fascinated by the changing terrain and scenery in Utah, all within a short distance.
(Yes, those were taken out the window of the moving bus. What was your first clue?)
It amazes me that people make these finds in the, seemingly, middle of nowhere. We could see the tracks better from a higher vantage point. This was quite a hive of activity about 200 million years ago.

I was finally learning to spot the tracks. Some were were more obvious than others.

After a morning devoted to learning and a delicious lunch at the Electric Cafe, it was time for the children to let off some steam. An afternoon at the local water park was just the place to cool off and expend some of their energy. It was a busy day. The children were still raring to go, but the grandparents were delighted we were staying in for the evening. Everyone enjoyed pizza and spent the evening watching movies about....what else?....DINOSAURS!

Travels With Abs - Dinosaur Discovery Site 6/30/2009

Abs and I were in St. George, Utah, to participate in the Elderhostel Program on dinosaurs. "Researching" dinosaurs has long been a favorite activity of 8 year old Abs, and I was to see on this trip just how much she had learned on her own. I had made her a series of T-shirts with different dinosaurs out of fanciful fabric and she wore a different one every day. I had also decorated a black canvas bag with an creature I had taken from a dinosaur coloring book my mom had given her. She took one look at the bag and loved it, but informed me that the animal was not a dinosaur.
"Well, what is it then," I asked rather huffily.
"It is a dimetrodon and it lived in the Permian period....BEFORE the dinosaurs," she said matter-of-factly.
Yes, I did learn a lot on this trip.

Our first activity on the first day was a trip to the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site at Johnson Farm, a dinosaur museum in St. George. The site was discovered by a farmer who was leveling the site for building. Fortunately, he stopped the work and called the University of Utah. A portion of the site has been left intact and the museum was built over it.
The bones and fossils recovered here are from the Jurassic Period, about 195 million years ago when the area was a large lake. I tried to imagine a lake in the surrounding arid area which boasted a temperature of 100+ degrees while we were there. It was difficult.

The museum has a collection of authentic dinosaur eggs which have allowed them to study eggs, nests, and embryos of the dinosaurs.

The photo below is of a single block of dinosaur tracks on display at the museum. There are over 49 individual tracks, many in rows, which give evidence of the way the track maker moved.

A Therapod footprint.

We were very privileged to have St. George's City Paleontologist, Andrew Milner, as our guide through the museum. He patiently gave explanations and answered questions about his work and all the things we saw. He gave a detailed explanation of using a track way to discover how an animal moved and sat. These types of discoveries often shed new light and negate previous theories.
After lunch, the children divided into 3 groups and spent the afternoon learning to make plaster casts from the coordinator, Marcia; identify and put together bones from various dinosaurs with Darrell McMahon, the education director; and exploring wildlife with Teal. Abs was delighted to finally see a real stegasaurus plate.
"It was much larger than I expected," she told me.Lovely, delicate- looking Teal, had caught some local critters and allowed the children to examine them closely. I was surprised when Abs was delighted to do a little snake-handling. A true conservationist, Teal was releasing the critters back into the wild at the end of the day.
All work and no play, makes a very dull child. The children hit the pool before dinner to work off a little extra energy after a long day of exciting learning.

Travels With Abs - "Kanab, Utah"

Kanab, Utah, is a sweet little town that, by chance and hard work, became a favored site for the making of western movies. We stayed at the Parry Lodge in the Frank Sinatra room. All the rooms are named for movie stars but, we learned later, Sinatra never stayed in our room. He stayed at the Parry home.
One movie was filmed in Kanab in the 1920's and Parry made it his mission to spread the word. He took a lot of photos and traveled to the 4-5 movie moguls to tout the town. They bought the idea and many western movies were made there over the next few decades. One of the last ones was "Josie Wales..." Filming the people traveling in one direction, then filming them in the opposite direction made it seem that they had traveled a long way and to an entirely different area. That was part of the beauty of filming in Kanab and the surrounding areas.
The people of Kanab rose to the occasion and became extras and stunt men just doing the things that were an ordinary parts of their lives - roping, riding, wrangling, etc. The Parrys arranged entertainment, including the townspeople in the festivities. Thus was born a successful business.
So, we had an interesting and restful time in Kanab. Went swimming, did laundry, and went to a local church on Sunday mornng. The church was a mixture of Methodist, Lutheran, and, United Church of Christ (DOC). Quite friendly and informal. Recently completed, this little church was a result of people working together to make it a reality. I was told that the Mormon people helped, even though they had no vested interest. That's one of the nice things about a small town.

Saturday night, we went to a screening of one of the old movies filmed in the area and almost made it through the whole thing. It starred Tom Mix, a young Tom Mix, and had a lot of hroses, riding, and the always loaded six-shooters in it.
We were only 1 1/2 hours away from our destination, but did not need to be there until Monday.