Shale Hills in the Bisti Badlands

The Bisti, part of the De-Na-Zin Wilderness administered by the Bureau of Land Management, is a magical, other-worldly, erosional landscape. In Navajo, "Bisti" means "large area of shale hills." It is characterized by thin, often lenticular beds of Paleocene Ojo Alamo sandstone overlying shales, mudstones, siltstones, minor sandstones, and coal of the Cretaceous Kirtland Formation. This unamed wash, a tributary of Hunter Wash, disects the badlands. Large areas of petrified wood and trees are located roughly 2 miles from the parking lots south of the wash; petrified stumps may be found north of the wash about a mile beyond the black, coal bearing mesa on the right.

Two small parking lots are located on Navajo Road 7293, approximately 2.5 miles east of NM Highway 371, 36 miles south of Farmington and 45 miles north of Crownpoint.