The Painted Desert

Follow Don and Paul as they dive headlong into the deepest of human questions and find answers outside words?answers that have to be experienced to be believed. Day 1: "Trips like ours are greener grass left unknown for fear of believing trite sayings; sayings that are sometimes true. But our friends back home live an existence under the weight and awareness of times; a place we are slowly escaping; a world growing fainter by the hour and the mile." Day 13: "It feels again that we are leaving who we were, moving on into the people we will become, hopefully, people with some kind of answers, some kind of thing to believe tht makes sense of beauty, of romance. Something that would explain the red glow against Paul's face, the red glow that seems to be coming off the console . . . 'Did you notice the engine light is lit, bud?' I ask . . ." Day 83: "I sit in the van, waiting for her to come out when I notice a window in one of the classrooms open, and a backpack comes falling out, spilling a few books onto the lawn. After the backpack comes Elida, falling atop the pack and laying low, peeking back into the window to see if the teacher noticed. She gathers her books, reaches into the classroom and closes the window, then runs toward the van as though this were a prison break." As you read Through Painted Deserts, you'll soon realize this is not just one man's account of finding light, God, and beauty on the open road. Rather, this book maps the journey you're already traveling . . . or soon will be.

"But this remote pocket of the Arizona desert, sandwiched between the Little Colorado River on one side and bold escarpments in the other, is much more than most tourists ever experience. An ethereal landscape of sculpted rock, wind-fluted cliffs, and elegantly drifting sand, the Painted Desert is a rich storehouse of natural beauty, colorful history, and scientific wonders. Here the strongest winds in Arizona blow across extensive dunefields, where less than ten inches of rain falls each year and only a few desert-savvy Navajo are able to live.".

From 1909 until the late 1920s, the Wetherill-Colville Guest Ranch in Kayenta, Arizona, was the primary stopover for writers, geologists, archeologists, adventurers, and tourists visiting Monument Valley and the Tsegi Canyon ruins. The artists who visited Kayenta during the early twentieth century included some of the most well known names in the American Southwest. See their paintings, illustrations, and photos of this beloved Southwest region. In addition, you will find full page guest registry entries illustrated by artists such as Maynard Dixon, William Robinson Leigh, James Swinnerton, Carl Oscar Borg, and Gunnar Widforss. The guest book serves as the archival record of those hardy individuals who ventured to the place that was, according to Dixon, "a long ways from anywhere, in any direction." Using over 390 enthralling illustrations and engaging text, this book explores the similarities and differences in the lives, artistic styles, and beliefs of the men and women who considered northern Arizona their favorite region.

Reproduction of the original: The Indians of the Painted Desert Region by George Wharton James

This book presents notes of the three most populated tribes of Hopi, Navaho, Wallapais, and Havasupais tribes. The author of the book pays much attention to the domestic life of the people from these tribes, their religion, traditions, and crafts. A reader will find interesting notes on religious dances like the famous Snake Dance of Hopi and the art of Navaho blanket weaving.