Dinosaur National Monument Rates Five Stars

The New Zealand Herald has published this article about Dinosaur National Monument. Reporter Brandon Loomis obviously did his homework and has crafted an article that is accurate and interesting. That's a nice change - so many travel pieces are fluffy and full of inaccuracies.

Below we give the article headline and then excerpts.

Utah: Jurassic park sequel a five star hit

It's a one-of-a-kind place where researchers have exposed, but not removed, a 15m x 61m wall of bones.

"Having that magic moment of seeing these dinosaur remains where they were buried is one of the things that is special about this place," says park palaeontologist Dan Chure.

Even hardened scientists stand in awe when they first arrive.

Over the years, until the government decided to preserve the rest of the fossils for viewing, universities and museums removed the bones of more than 600 creatures from either side of the remaining wall. Besides 10 species of dinosaurs, the quarry has yielded a crocodile, two turtles, a lizard, tens of thousands of freshwater clams and carbonised plant remains.

At least 100 individual dinosaurs remain exposed and the profile skull of a plant-eating Camarasaurus is prominent.

Of course, there is more to the monument than bones. The park also offers whitewater rafting and scenic drives or hikes into canyon country. There's riverside desert camping among tiny, scurrying lizards, and recently hundreds of sandhill cranes flapped in the Green River on a migratory stopover, their croaks a reminder of the march of time and biology since the Jurassic Period.

Read the entire article.

- Dave Webb