I encouraged everyone from our trip to write at least one “blog” post about something that stood out. Giulia from Italy decided to share “The Navajo Experience” with us! Enjoy!

Written by Giulia
Edited a little by Lauren

We had to spend one night in the Monument Valley, and the day before our night, most of us were asking: Will we have electricity in the Navajo residence? Will we have a shower? Will we have pillows? No one knew the answers to these questions, and this was just the beginning of our incredible night!

We were in Monument Valley in the morning, and we immediately met John, our Navajo guide for one day. He was nice. He answered all the questions we asked, opening for us the door of the Navajo world.

In the afternoon, we took a great tour of the Monument Valley on a sort of open truck. I have never seen such wild landscapes in my life, red mountains, sand rocks, free horses, sheep, dogs….and the sunset in the Monument Valley was awesome! After the sunset you could see the strange shapes of the mountains and this is beautiful.

Afterwards, we ate a typical Navajo dinner called Navajo taco, that reminds me of a Sicilian dish, called “cuzzola fritta” (sometimes the world is so small). After dinner we took part in a special Navajo dance, It was funny!

Then John showed us where we would sleep. We had two choices: the first – sleep outside under a magnificent sky with thousand of stars or the second – inside the Hogan (the typical Navajo house) where the temperature was quite hot, but in my opinion there were less dangers inside (in terms of animals).

So I preferred to sleep inside, I heard that outside my traveling companions were at the mercy of small dogs that tried to protect them from some crazy horses by barking when the horses came near. Anyway, it was the worst night of my life, I think I slept just a couple of hours. I was afraid of bugs, insects, and other unidentified animals that live in the valley.

The morning after this night, It was hard to wake up without water (and without a shower) and with a sort of primitive toilet that was really just a hole.

I overcame this drawback, and I saw probably one of the best sunrises of my life… I don’t know if It was the best because It meant that the terrible night was over or just because It was really magic. Anyway, I really enjoyed the Navajo overnight experience for the landscapes that we saw and because It’s important sometimes to have an extreme experience, but  I will never do it again! : )