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Arizona Strip & Southern Utah Wanderings | Day 2
Sunday, October 7, 2012

On Sunday we had permits to visit Coyote Buttes South. I spent a few hours in Coyote Buttes South back in February, but was looking forward to exploring more of the area today. We woke up extra early this morning so that we could get over to Cottonwood Cove before the sun came up. Aside from one small patch of clouds at sunrise, the sky was totally clear all day, so I spent much of the day searching out intimate scenes that showcased the unusual and colorful sandstone found here.

My first destination was at this very interesting rock known as Half & Half. I wanted to get a photo of this one in the soft dawn light.

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Half by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Here’s that one small patch of clouds we saw in the morning over another colorful and strange rock.

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A Few Clouds by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

When the sun finally came up we made our way over towards the Control Tower.

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Control Tower by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

There are lines everywhere!

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More Lines by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

My long shadow as Jared takes a photo in the distance.

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My Shadow by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Lines and colors, lines and colors…

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Converge by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

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White Lines by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

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Contrast by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

A few flowers with some nice sandstone in the background.

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Flowers by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

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Broken by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

As we were leaving, this scene caught my eye.

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Transition by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

After spending much of the morning exploring the Cottonwood Cove area, we decided to hike over to the nearby South Teepees to try and locate some petroglyphs that were supposed to be over there. We managed to find them, but they were very hard to see with the naked eye and even harder to photograph, so I didn’t get any photos worth posting. Since the midday light was very harsh, I didn’t really take any photos from around the teepees, either.

When we returned from the South Teepees we drove over to the Paw Hole trailhead so we could explore a new area of Coyote Buttes South.

The three colors of sandstone here reminded me of Neapolitan ice cream.

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Neapolitan by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Jared photographs the Yellow Stripe from atop a large sand dune.

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Jared and the Stripe by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Colorful stains on colorful sandstone…

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Stain by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

I like the transition from sandstone to sand in this scene.

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Sand to Sand by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Shortly before sunset we returned to the Cottonwood Cove area and visited another unique formation known as the Totem Pole or The Queen.

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Totem by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

I liked the way the large spire cast it’s shadow on the sandstone wall behind.

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Queen & Shadow by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

I had wanted to stick around for some night shots, but we were both pretty exhausted and had not had anything for dinner yet, so we ended up heading back to our camp near The White Pocket shortly after the sun was down. When we arrived back at camp we were greeted by two people who decided to set up their camp a little too close to us (in my opinion, at least…it’s not like there isn’t plenty of room out there…), but since we were tired and hungry we let it go. We had a quick dinner, I uploaded some photos off my memory card, and then we went to bed.

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