October 20, 2010: Silver City, NM
	October 18, 2010: Sedona to Winslow, AZ
	Return to the Index for our Western Trip

Today we had planned to do two thing, but we added a third after dinner last night. First, we'll backtrack a few miles and visit Meteor Crater National Natural Landmark. Then, as a result of what we saw last night, we'll return to Winslow, Arizona, and make a stop in the center of town at an historic corner. Finally, we will drive over towards Silver City, New Mexico, and do a hike in the Gila Wilderness at Whitewater Canyon before staying in Silver City for the night.

Meteor Crater National Natural Landmark

After we'd had a bit of breakfast at the Super 8, we got back on I-40 west and drove about eighteen miles to the exit for Meteor Crater. We went south on Meteor Crater Road about six miles to the visitor center for the crater. We parked, paid our admission, and went on in to the museum/gift shop area.

What is Meteor Crater?

Meteor Crater is a meteorite impact crater; one of the largest in the country and certainly the most recognizable and accessible. Because the US Department of the Interior Division of Names commonly recognizes names of natural features derived from the nearest post office, the feature acquired the name of "Meteor Crater" from the nearby post office in the town of Meteor. The site was formerly known as the Canyon Diablo Crater, and the meteorite that created the crater is officially called the Canyon Diablo Meteorite, the name that is on all officially labelled fragments of the meteorite. Scientists refer to the crater as Barringer Crater in honor of Daniel Barringer who was first to suggest that it was produced by meteorite impact. The crater is privately owned by the Barringer family through their Barringer Crater Company, which proclaims it to be "the first proven, best-preserved meteorite crater on earth."

Despite its importance as a geological site, the crater is not protected as a national monument, a status that would require federal ownership. It was designated a National Natural Landmark in November 1967. It lies at an elevation of about one mile above sea level. It is about 4,000 ft. in diameter, 570 ft. deep, and is surrounded by a rim that rises 150 ft. above the surrounding plains. One of the interesting features of the crater (that you can see in the aerial view at left )is its squared-off outline, believed to be caused by pre-existing regional jointing (cracks) in the strata at the impact site.

The crater was created about 50,000 years ago during the Pleistocene epoch when the local climate on the Colorado Plateau was much cooler and damper. At the time, the area was an open grassland dotted with woodlands inhabited by woolly mammoths and giant ground sloths. It was probably not inhabited by humans; the earliest confirmed record of human habitation in the Americas dates from long after this impact.

The object that excavated the crater was a nickel-iron meteorite about 160 ft. across, which impacted the plain at a speed of several miles per second. The speed of the impact has been a subject of some debate. Modeling initially suggested that the meteorite struck at a speed of up to 45,000 mph, but more recent research suggests the impact was substantially slower- 28,600 mph. It is believed that about half of the meteor's 300,000 ton bulk was vaporized during its descent, before it hit the ground. The meteor itself was mostly vaporized; very little of it remained within the pit that it had excavated.

History

The crater came to the attention of scientists following its discovery by European settlers in the 19th century. Dubbed the Canyon Diablo crater – from Canyon Diablo, Arizona, the closest community to the crater in the late 19th century (but now a ghost town)- it had initially been ascribed to the actions of a volcano. This was not an unreasonable assumption, as the San Francisco volcanic field lies only about 40 miles to the west.

In 1891 Grove Karl Gilbert, chief geologist for the U.S. Geological Survey, investigated the crater and concluded that it was the result of a volcanic steam explosion. Gilbert had assumed that if it were an impact crater then the volume of the crater, as well as meteoritic material, should be present on the rim. Gilbert also assumed a large portion of the meteorite should be buried in the crater and that this would generate a large magnetic anomaly. Gilbert's calculations showed that the volume of the crater and the debris on the rim were roughly equivalent, so that the mass of the hypothetical meteor was missing. Further there were no magnetic anomalies. Gilbert argued that the meteorite fragments found on the rim were coincidental. Gilbert would publicize these conclusions in a series of lectures in 1895, although in 1892 he would be among the first to propose that the moon's craters were caused by impact rather than volcanism.

In 1903, mining engineer and businessman Daniel M. Barringer suggested that the crater had been produced by the impact of a large iron-metallic meteorite. Barringer's company, the Standard Iron Company, received a patent signed by Theodore Roosevelt for 640 acres around the center of the crater in 1903. The claim was divided into four quadrants coming from the center clockwise from northwest named Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. In 1906 Roosevelt authorized the establishment of a newly named Meteor, Arizona post office.

Standard Iron Company conducted research on the crater's origins between 1903 and 1905. It concluded that the crater had indeed been caused by an impact. Barringer and his partner, the mathematician and physicist Benjamin Chew Tilghman, documented evidence for the impact theory in papers presented to the U.S. Geological Survey in 1906 and published in the Proceedings of the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia.

Barringer's arguments were met with skepticism, as there was a reluctance at the time to consider the role of meteorites in terrestrial geology. He persisted and sought to bolster his theory by locating the remains of the meteorite. At the time of first discovery by Europeans, the surrounding plains were covered with about 30 tons of large oxidized iron meteorite fragments. This led Barringer to believe that the bulk of the impactor could still be found under the crater floor. Impact physics was poorly understood at the time and Barringer was unaware that most of the meteorite vaporized on impact. He spent 27 years trying to locate a large deposit of meteoric iron, and drilled to a depth of 1400 ft., but no significant deposit was ever found.

Despite Barringer's findings and other excavations in the early 20th century, geologists' skepticism continued until the 1950s when planetary science gained in maturity and understanding of cratering processes increased. Professor Herman Leroy Fairchild, an early promoter of impact cratering, argued Barringer's case in an article in Science in 1930.

It was not until 1960 that later research by Eugene Merle Shoemaker would confirm Barringer's hypothesis. The key discovery was the presence in the crater of the mineral stishovite, a rare form of silica found only where quartz-bearing rocks have been severely shocked by an instantaneous overpressure. It cannot be created by volcanic action; the only known mechanism of creating it is through an impact event (or artificially through a nuclear explosion). Shoemaker's discovery is considered the first definitive proof of an extraterrestrial impact on the Earth's surface. Since then, numerous impact craters have been identified around the world, though Meteor Crater remains one of the most visually impressive due to its size, young age and lack of vegetation cover.

Geology

The impact created an inverted topography so that the layers immediately exterior to the rim are stacked in opposite order in which they normally occur; the impact overturned and inverted the layers to a distance of one to two miles outward from the crater's edge. Specifically, climbing the rim of the crater from outside, one finds:

        Coconino Sandstone (sandstone formed 265 million years ago) nearest the top of the rim
        Toroweap Formation (limestone formed 255 million years ago)
        Kaibab Formation (dolomite formed 250 million years ago)
        Moenkopi Formation (mudstone formed 200 million years ago) nearest the outer foot of the rim

In the interior of the crater the layers are in the expected order.  

Meteor Crater Today

Meteor Crater is today a popular tourist attraction privately owned by the Barringer family, with an admission fee charged to see the crater. The Meteor Crater Visitor Center on the north rim features interactive exhibits and displays (some of which you can see if you click on the thumbnails at left) about meteorites and asteroids, space, the solar system and comets. It features the American Astronaut Wall of Fame, and such artifacts on display as an Apollo boilerplate command module (BP-29), a 1,406 pound meteorite found in the area, and meteorite specimens from Meteor Crater that can be touched. I would have taken more pictures, but the lighting was iffy, and even some of the pictures I did take were a little fuzzy. Formerly known as the Museum of Astrogeology, the Visitor Center includes a movie theater, a gift shop, and observation areas with views inside the rim of the crater. Impact Animation/Re-creation There was one interesting exhibit which was a re-creation of the impact, and so I made a movie of the movie.   Recent History and Trivia During the 1960s, NASA astronauts trained in the crater to prepare for the Apollo missions to the Moon. On August 8, 1964, a pair of commercial pilots in a Cessna 150 flew low over the crater. On crossing the rim, they could not maintain level flight. The pilot attempted to build up speed by circling in the crater to climb over the rim. During the attempted climb out, the aircraft stalled, crashed, and caught fire. It is commonly reported that the plane ran out out of fuel, but this is incorrect. Both occupants were severely injured but survived their ordeal. A small portion of the wreckage not removed from the crash site remains visible to this day. The crater was used as the setting for the climax of the 1984 film Starman. The crater is used in the game Civilization V as a natural wonder that the player can find.   Our Guided Tour Guided tours of the rim are offered every 90 minutes or so, and of course we decided to take one of these tours. The tour began in the museum with our tour guide giving us some of the explanations that I've included above. Then we all put on our sunglasses and followed him outside. At the left is an aerial view of the north edge of Meteor Crater, including the Visitor Center and Museum. I have marked on the view the approximate route that we took on our guided tour. Essentially, we walked along the north rim of the crater and then around the northwest corner and a bit further south. Along the way, our tour guide stopped to offer information on the history of the crater, the geology of it, interesting facts and figures, and so on. About the only thing to do in offering you the pictures and movies of the tour is to take it in sections, as near as I can, with each stop the tour guide made being the end of a section. I think you'll be able to tell from the perspective of the views down into or across the crater how we are moving along its rim. For the first section, the guide led us perhaps 200 feet out along the rim trail from the visitor center. Along the way, we passed the previous tour returning on the path. First Movie of Meteor Crater About halfway out to the first overlook, I stopped to make a movie of Meteor Crater, now that we had an unobstructed view of it. About 200 feet out there was an overlook where we could all gather around and listen to our guide, and here he talked about the initial excavations conducted by Berringer. When we got to the overlook, Fred took some pictures as we all gathered around. One looks north from the crater, and the other two are of our tour group. Click on the thumbnails at right to have a look at these pictures. Fred also took the opportunity to stitch together a couple of pictures in his camera to get a nice panoramic shot of the crater, and you can see it below: As I said, it was at this first stop that our guide gave us some of the history behind Meteor Crater, and especially the role that Daniel Berringer played in its investigation and development. The Work of Daniel Berringer I wanted at least a couple of movies of our guide; in this one, he is talking about the investigation that Berringer carried out trying to locate the mother lode iron meteorite that he thought existed. As he talked, Fred used his zoom to take some pictures of the equipment and other things down in the crater, and if you will click on the thumbnails below you can see them:

I also took some pictures from our first stop on the tour, and if you click on the thumbnails below you can have a look at them:

The next section of the tour took us all the way to the northwest corner of the crater rim. Along the way, our guide stopped a couple of times with some very interesting (and entertaining) information. At the last stop in this section, we got a geology lesson about the crater, and looked at some rocks and fossils.

Life at Meteor Crater At one stop, our guide waxed eloquent about what it's like living and working at Meteor Crater and on the ranch where it's located. Fred made an excellent movie of his sentiments, and you should really watch it.

Mormon Tea I made a movie while our guide was telling us about a desert plant called "Mormon Tea," and about how it got its name. Very amusing!

Fred took a number of good pictures along this leg of the tour, and they are the first half-dozen pictures in the slideshow below.

Click on the Image Above to View the Slideshow

On the last leg of the tour, we rounded the northwest corner of the rim and went another hundred feet or so south along the rim, passing the ruins of some turn-of-the-century ranch buildings and going under a rock overhang to our final stopping point and views of the crater. It's hard to eliminate pictures from those we took along here; almost every one of them turned out quite well. But I've selected the best fourteen (seven from Fred and seven from me) of the many pictures we took for inclusion as the last fourteen pictures in the slideshow at left.

To view the slideshow, just click on the image at left and I will open the slideshow in a new window. In the slideshow, you can use the little arrows in the lower corners of each image to move from one to the next, and the index numbers in the upper left of each image will tell you where you are in the series. When you are finished looking at the pictures, just close the popup window.

Meteor Crater, Arizona From the last stop on our guided tour, I made this movie, panning back and forth across Meteor Crater.

When we returned to the visitor center, we thanked our tour guide and then went out to the observation platforms.

Going out the back of the museum, we found ourselves at the head of a set of stairways. One went up to the east to the highest overlook platform here. The other went down to two overlooks; one was a platform jutting out over the crater and the other was a sheltered overlook with some benches for those who might wish to stay awhile. From our guided tour, Fred happened to take a picture looking back at the visitor center and these overlooks. I've put some labels on the picture to supplement what you can see on the aerial view at left, and these should give you a good idea of what the overlooks were like. Take a look at that annotated picture here.

So when we went out the back of the museum, we found ourselves at the beginning of both sets of stairs. We decided to go down first, but before we did so, Fred snapped a picture of me at the top of these stairs. I returned the favor, and you can see a picture of Fred with the stairs leading down to the sheltered overlook here. So we first walked down to the sheltered overlook, where I sat down to admire the view.

Then Fred had me walk out onto the cantilevered platform so he could take a picture of me. I got Fred to join me on the platform so I could get a picture of him with the northern rim of the crater in the background, and you can see that picture here.

To complete our tour of the overlooks, we walked back up the stairs to the visitor center and then up the long sidewalk stairs to the high overlook. From here, there were amazing views of Meteor Crater. And I took a picture, looking west and down into the crater, of Fred, on this beautiful day at Meteor Crater.

Meteor Crater from the High Overlook

Here at our last stop at the high overlook, Fred made an excellent movie of Meteor Crater, and watching it is a fitting way to end our visit here.

We'd seen about all there was to see here, so we went back through the Museum/Gift Shop out to the courtyard entry area. There, I just happened to see a pretty tabby cat, so I sat down and coaxed it over to get petted. Fred snapped a candid of me petting the cat. The other interesting feature here in the courtyard was the "window" in the north-facing brick wall, through which you could look out many miles across the high desert to the mountains in the background. We each wanted a picture here, so I took one of Fred and he took one of me.

That was it for Meteor Crater. I'd always wanted to visit here, and I am glad that I finally got the chance. We went back to the parking area to head back east again for a short stop in Winslow.

Standing on a Corner in Winslow, Arizona

From Meteor Crater, our plan was to head on east towards Silver City, New Mexico, to visit Jean and L.H. Rodgers; Jean is Fred's stepmother's sister. Since we had to go right back by Winslow, Arizona, we thought we'd stop at the city's major attraction. What is that attraction? To answer that question, have a listen to this snippet of "Take it Easy" by The Eagles (just click the little play button for the player below):

That's right; we are going to the center of Winslow and stand on the corner made famous in the song. To get there, we went back out Meteor Crater Road to I-40 and headed east. We got off at the same exit we'd used last night to get to the Super 8; that exit is Route 66.

The first thing I want to point out about the aerial view is that it was obviously taken some time ago; as you can see from some of the pictures we took here, there is a huge Route 66 shield painted in the middle of the intersection of Second and N. Kinsley, and it doesn't show up in the aerial view. I am not sure the statue shows up either; it's tough to tell since the resolution is not as good as in more populatedd areas.

Anyway, we drove into town and parked a block west of Standin' on the Corner Park, the official name for the strip of land on the northwest corner of the intersection. The park is a small one, actually consisting almost entirely of the statue representing the person who was standing on the corner in the song. In one of the pictures that Fred took, you can even see the girl in the bright red Ford painted on the store window behind the statue.

It was a little kitschy, but when you're Winslow, Arizona, you take advantage of such fame as comes your way. Nearby, there was a stenciled plaque identifying Second Street as part of Historic Route 66, and across N. Kinsley was the Standin' on the Corner store. It was a neat place to stop, kind of in the same category as Cadillac Ranch or the World's Largest Ball of String.

We headed out of Winslow going east, stopping at a small park at the east end of town to have a bit of lunch.

Hiking Up Whitewater Canyon

Now we were headed over towards Silver City, New Mexico.

We began by taking I-40 east to Holbrook, Arizona. There, we had to get off the Interstate and onto US 180, which took us through town and right past an attraction known as Wigwam Village. Each of the rooms in this old motel is a wigwam (not a real one, of course) and, for effect, there is a vintage car parked permanently in front of each one. This was another of those "attractions" like the Standin' on the Corner Park over in Winslow- something you should see if you have to go by it anyway.

We continued down US Highway 180 all the way through St. Johns and on to Springerville. The road was just two lanes, but we could easily do 70 or 75 (as were the other few cars we passed). And the scenery was quite nice, with low rolling hills and a decent amount of fall color.

Catwalk road took us about five miles into the Gila Wilderness to the parking area for the Whitewater Canyon National Recreation Trail.

We found the parking area with little problem, and we were one of only three cars there this late in the day. (And since we didn't see anyone else on the catwalk trail, we had to assume that they were backpacking somewhere nearby in the Gila National Forest.)

At the left is a picture I took of Fred at the trailhead. If you want to look more closely at the small pictures on the sign and read their captions more easily, just click on those small pictures, and each will open in larger size in its own window. Don't forget to close those windows when you are done.

We got started on the 1 mile hike about 6PM, New Mexico time. The canyon itself was already in shadow, although the mountaintops around us were still in sunlight. That would change as we went along; as it turned out, there was just enough light to get the pictures we wanted, although when we were done with the hike we thought that it would have been much more spectacular had we been able to do it in the middle of the day when the interior of the canyon is illuminated. But the canyon was narrow, and the window of opportunity for those perfect pictures would be only an hour or two, even in summer.

Before you look at a lot of pictures of the catwalk and the canyon, I think it might be helpful to give you an appreciation of just what the hike was like, and the best way to do that is to watch the best movie that I made.

Hiking the Catwalk in Whitewater Canyon In this movie, I can show you what it was like to walk along the catwalk through Whitewater Canyon. The catwalks were over half of the hike; the rest of it was on trails between catwalk segments. So walk along with me for a ways and you'll see what the hike was like.

As we started off on our short hike in the fading afternoon light, the trail quickly rose to hug the side of the canyon as I followed Fred up the canyon. And, pretty soon, the trail turned into metal walkways that were suspended from the rocks.

Below is an aerial view of the area we were hiking in, and I've marked the approximate route of the catwalk trail:

And now for the hike itself:

The hike led us over a varied trail, with all kinds of interesting features along it. For one thing, we were walking above or along Whitewater Creek, and there were a number of pretty little waterfalls for us to look at and listen to. At times, there was enough land on either side of the creek that the trail didn't need constructed walkways but still needed stone stairs and metal handrails to ascend quickly. At one point, the trail led through a tunnel under overhanging rocks, while at another point it had to climb a steep set of metal stairs.

At one point, there was a neat suspension bridge that crossed the canyon. There was a section where the trail divided and you could go up the trail one way but come back a different way on your return. Why they did that I am not sure, except that you could see both sides of the canyon that way. One of the last features on the trail was a high bridge that crossed over the canyon and brought you presently to the end of the catwalk trail. From that point, you could continue up into the National Forest on some longer trails, and we presumed that was where the occupants of the other cars in the parking lot had gone. The light was getting dim down in the canyon, and we didn't want to be hiking in the dark, so we just went to the end of the catwalk trail and headed back. Even so, by the time we were on the last quarter mile of the trail we were using the flashlights we'd brought along.

We took quite a few other pictures on the hike. I've eliminated the fuzzy ones (mostly mine) and the duplicates and can show you the rest here. Just click on any of the thumbnails below to have a look at these pictures:

From Fred:

And from me:

Well, that was it for our hiking today- and just in time for it had gotten quite dark.

We planned to stay in Silver City this evening, so we got back on Highway 180 and took that all the way to Silver City. We continued through town and about halfway to Santa Clara on Highway 180 to find a Rodeway Inn (another partner in Wyndham Rewards like Super 8). We got a nice room and pretty soon went out to a local family restaurant for an excellent dinner. Then we did our photos and Fred called Jean and L.H. to set up a meeting time with them tomorrow.

You can use the links below to continue to the album page for different day.

	October 20, 2010: Silver City, NM
	October 18, 2010: Sedona to Winslow, AZ
	Return to the Index for our Western Trip