Fairy Smurfland, aka Goblin Valley

In our latest venture to bizarre places, Mike and I drove through the Utah desert to reach Goblin Valley, a spooky little land with lots of mushroom rocks on the edge of the San Rafael swell.



As childish as it sounds, we found it was especially fun to run around the rocks and hide in the shadows. Goblin Valley would be the most incredible place to play nocturnal hide-and-seek. It's amazing to explore the valley, especially when a rainstorm has washed away everyone else's footprints recently and you feel like maybe you're the first person walking among the hoodoos.

The other amusing thing to do at Goblin Valley is spotting rocks that look like other things. We found and named Hamster Rock, Gorilla Rock, Scary Neanderthal Rock, Turtle Rock and even this one, Shrek Rock.















Check it out at www.utah.com/stateparks/goblin_valley.htm. It's about 2 1/2 hours driving from GJ.