I rode up to Blanding from home today. I need to burn some vacation days and am taking Mon. and Tues. off. I went through Monument Valley today when the sun was not in a great spot for photos. And there was just about no one around to take photos of me. So it's just the bike and the rock formations.
Riding through Navajo Nation is very depressing. Tuba City and Kayenta are the two of what passes for towns in the part of NN we call Arizona. Those folks could pass for poor people in other countries. It's sad and depressing. At one gas station I stopped at between those two cities, with about 75 miles of absolutely nothing between them, there were barefoot kids and four stray dogs sunning themselves on the asphalt. The last white man I saw was at a gas station just outside Flagstaff and then tonight when I went to get beer at a gas station outside of Blanding (a dry town). In NN trailers are the nice houses and there are plenty of plywood shanties that look like little more than dog pens. Man, it sucks there.
Anyway, off to Moab and Arches tomorrow, then back roads to Cedar City and back home through Zion with a stop in Colorado City to pick up another wife or two. More photos coming.