Dinosaur Valley State Park, just south-west of Fort Worth, is an area of parkland where fossilised dinosaur footprints have been exposed in layer of limestone rock. The Paluxy River has eroded softer layers of mudstone to reveal impressions from several types of dinosaur along it's banks and beds.
Whilst still shallow, the level of the Paluxy River is currently higher than normal following the high rainfall Texas received in the spring, so many of the footprints were under knee-deep water. However, there was a fantastic park ranger who walked, or waded, the five of us up the river showing us the footprints of a family of four
Acrocanthosaurus, relatives of the Tyrannosaurs, which were 18 inches wide and over two feet long. Standing in a 113 million year old footprint of a dinosaur, with claw prints still clearly defined, was just awesome. The ranger also showed us footprints on the banks from
Pleurocoelus, a sauropod related to the Brontosaurs.
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| The ranger showing us the Acrocanthosaurus footprints, and Evan stepping in a Pleurocoelus footprint. |
The kids also enjoyed cooling off in the river and jumping into the Blue Lagoon, a deep pool in the river. And of course we had the obligatory ice creams.
Dinosaur Valley State Park also had plenty of living creatures to see. When we drove up to the main entrance there were three hanging hummingbird feeders and several hummingbirds flying back and forth right in front of our car. There was also an enormous, 2-3 inch long spider hanging from the State Park sign, we had to get out and have a look at him on our way home. You can see it hanging above the 'N' in dinosaur in the photo above, thankfully it tuned out to be a relatively harmless Yellow Garden Spider. All in all it was a fabulous way to spend the Labor Day holiday, also my birthday!
