Day 7: Museum of Northern Arizona & Sunset Crater

Yesterday was a full day, and we forgot to blog at the end of it.  Oops!  Right after breakfast, we set up experiments.  One group built large blocks made of sugar cubes and caulking.  Another set up salt solutions and made predictions about crystal formation.  A third group had Kestral weather meters and took measurements throughout the day and the fourth took measurements with infrared thermometers. 

After we got everything set up, we headed out to the Museum of Northern Arizona.  We learned about the different native cultures of the Colorado Plateau: the Hopi, Zuni, Navajo, and the Pai (Yavapai, Havasupai, Hualapai).  The museum had displays about the lifestyles and art of each culture.  We also learned about the geology of the Colorado Plateau.  The Grand Canyon shows many of the layers and exposes the discontinuities, where millions of years are missing from the rock record.

In the afternoon, we headed up to Sunset Crater National Monument.  Sunset Crater is a very young cinder cone volcano (under 1000 years old).  We met Charlie Gray, a ranger, who took us on a hike.  He grew up in western Massachusetts (in the same town where Ms. Ruby went to college).  Ranger Gray explained that Sunset Crater gets its name from the red colors at the top.  The cinder (loose small volcanic pieces) has a lot of hematite in it, and the cinders that were exposed to gas clouds with lots of sulfuric acid turned red.  Sunset Crater is the youngest of a big field of volcanoes that includes the San Francisco peaks and has all four kinds of volcanoes (cinder cones, lava domes, composite volcanoes, and shield volcanoes).

Ranger Gray showing us a hornito (a little side crater)

Gary pointing to the volcano