With a couple of days off in the middle of the week for Veterans Day, we decided to take a short trip to the Pinnacles National Monument for some hiking, cave exploration and family fun time.

Pinnacles is a funny place. Driving up highway 25, the area seems unremarkable with a lot of farm and ranch land. Even when you turn off to the park area on highway 146, it just seems like there isn’t much there: Oak trees, grey pines and rolling hills. Ok. so why is this a national monument? Teddy Roosevelt made it one over 100 years ago for gosh sake.

When you get to the campground, there still isn’t much to look at. And right now the campground is in a state of renewal and repair. They are currently building a new RV campsite area in what is currently the group campsite area. They are also building a beautiful new wood rail fence along  the park road – I think they got some Obama money.

The rock formations of The Pinnacles National Monument

The yellow billed magpie

Having fun on the trail

But when you get to the hiking trails it all starts to make sense. When you look up at the rock formations, you’ve just got to say WOW at just about every turn on the hiking trail. It almost seems like you are in the Utah hills with the red rock formations that rise above you. Also the wild life is incredible. We saw tons of deer and an interesting bird, the yellow billed Magpie.

Once the new RV camp site is complete (probably by late spring), we will be coming back to enjoy the hiking trails and spring flowers.

One thing you should know is that there is no water hookup for the RV sites. As long as you bring your own water can to fill-up your tank (we have a six gallon one), you will be fine.

Below is a video of some deer that were grazing right by our campsite close to night fall on Nov. 12th.