this is travel, not tourism

Valley of Fire is a Nevada State Park about a one hour drive from Las Vegas, it’s similar to the other state and national parks in the area, characterized by bright red sand and an unending horizon, think Mars. A nice escape if you’re in Las Vegas.
Don’t miss the petroglyphs at Atlatl Rock.

Alongside Chaco Canyon in New Mexico these ruins are probably the most impressive Anasazi ruins in the Southwest. They were built around 1200 AD and in the 70s were recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The charm of these ruins is that they're all cliff dwellings - the tightly fit stone buildings aren't exactly in caves, but they're inside recessions in steep cliff walls.

Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park is one of the most picturesque areas of the southwestern desert. The red sandstone buttes combine with the deep blue sky and open horizon. This area of Northern Arizona and Utah is in the middle of the Navajo Nation Reservation. There are various trails and guided tours as well as campsites right in the park, if your more of a hotel person than a sleeping bag person the website lists places to stay within 100 miles.

These undergound caves are near the border with Texas in the Guadalupe Mountain Range in southeastern New Mexico. We made repeated visits when I was a child and I always found it kind of terrifying as well as beautiful. Take warm clothes, even in the middle of summer it is cold down there.

The Painted Desert is a name for the large desert area spreading through the Navajo Nation Reservation in Northern Arizona. It runs into the Grand Canyon and other natural parks like Petrified Forest.

This massive dam, built in 1936 on the Colorado River, creates Lake Mead and generates the power for Las Vegas, which you won’t be surprised to hear is a whole hell of a lot (on the drive from Las Vegas to the Hoover Dam you can watch the power lines as they grow bigger and bigger). It is hard to imagine how beautiful this big Black Canyon would have been before it got filled with concrete, but remember this is downstream on the same river that formed the Grand Canyon.

Close to the New Mexico/Texas/Mexico border, this is a National Park with bright white sand dunes! The sand is made from gypsum, and is surprisingly not hot to the touch, despite the high temperatures in the area.

More than anything it is a cool place to see, and is right next to the White Sands Missile Range. It's a good place to make a quick stop and jump around in the dunes. If you're looking for a really different desert landscape, this may be it.

The ruins in this national historic park were the largest buildings in the United States until the 19th century. Construction of these massive stone buildings started sometime in the 800s by ancient pueblo peoples (also known as the anasazi, or ancestral puebloans).

The site was abandoned suddenly by its inhabitants in the mid 1100s.

One of the oldest communities in the United States, Acoma has been inhabited continuously since the 12th century. The pueblo sits on top of a sandstone mesa, and like all of the pueblos in the southwest has a terribly sad history. The guided tours are packed with information, and are great for those interested in Spanish colonialism and Native American history.

A good place to stop and stretch your legs if you’re taking what was Route-66, now the I-40, through this stretch. It’s not the most beautiful landscape in the area, but it is covered with fossils and the park’s namesake, petrified wood. They’ve also made some large finds of dinosaur bones here.

Close to the Needles District of Canyonlands National Park, this is a dark volcanic rock that is densely filled with petroglyphs dating back as far as 2000 years old from the Fremont and Anasazi peoples, and some from a more modern hand.

This site on the White Sands Missile Range is where the first atomic bomb was tested as part of the Manhattan Project in 1945. Weeks later similar bombs were dropped on Japan.

Here, you can see ground zero and can also visit the McDonald ranch were the bomb was assembled.

There are open houses twice a year, check the website to make sure that it will be open when you're planning your trip.

A huge crater caused by the impact of a meteor some 50,000 years ago! Unfortunately seeing it up close is less impressive than the aerial shots of it, but you still get a great feeling of its immense size when standing on one edge and looking across. The vistor’s center is packed with information about the site.

This national park holds the most impressive natural sandstone arches (or bridges) in the area. They are formed by erosion of different layers of the sandstone usually by snow, or freezing.

You can also find Ute petroglyphs within the park.

This park contains different geological formations (canyons, buttes, and mesas) formed by the Colorado River. It is divided into different sections, and for one day visits Island in the Sky is probably the best bet, you can even see some of the sights on a drive through. Needles is also quite beautiful.

For longer backpacking trips check out the Maze.