Our next stop on Uncle Dan’s Dinosaur Tour was right across the street from our off-roading adventure – convenient! Dan had us all excited about the famous Trail Through Time.

We wandered past a few excavation sites before our first stop – a dinosaur pelvis.

The signage was really helpful – showing not only the type of dinosaur from which the fossil likely came, and where it was located within the dinosaur’s body, but also exactly where to find it in today’s rock.

To be honest, the kids were a bit underwhelmed with this part. It did take some imagining to put it back in the dinosaur’s body. It was clear that this wasn’t ordinary rock, but not especially obvious what it was – unless you knew (which we did, thanks, signage!). The adults all thought it was really cool, though.

We blitzed past a few other fossils in rock before coming to a stop at the highlight of the day – part of the spine of a diplodocus! Sauropods are my jam, so I was excited about this. But we were all excited – now this was obviously dinosaur bone.

Nugget got a paleontology lesson from Aunt Danielle.

I mean, it doesn’t get much more awesome than that, does it?

Right in the rock and there for anyone to see and touch!

Such a neat experience, and surrounded by gorgeous scenery, too – can’t beat that. We could have stayed for hours, but the sun was starting to set and we had to beat the daylight back to the cars. Uncle Dan promised more dinosaur excitement later in the week, so stay tuned.

Next week: crossing off a bucket list item with a hike to an iconic American sight.