{ LOUIE PSIHOYOS/GETTY IMAGES


PALEONTOLOGY IS PERFORMANCE ART IN UTAH.


Massive bones dwarf workers on the quarry wall in Dinosaur National Monument.


themselves never really left. From Montana to California, dinosaurs are enjoying a revival of sorts at museums and dig sites. Whether you’re a hard-core enthusiast or just an admirer of biology pushed to extremes, there’s never been a better time to experience the creatures for yourself. The wall of bones in the national monument’s


quarry is a great place to start. Plates from the back of a Stegosaurus rest near the pelvic bone of a carnivorous Allosaurus. And articulated vertebrae still trail from the skull of a long- necked Camarasaurus. Sauropods—plant eaters that weighed as much as 60 tons—dominate the scene, much as they did over 100 million years ago. Visitors are encouraged to touch a couple


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of sauropod femurs at the bottom of the wall. The bones feel like cool, smooth rocks somehow supercharged with meaning. They once carried a lot of weight—and they still do. Visitors can see even more bones in a gully just downhill from the parking lot. Walking along the trail, you can quickly test your inner paleon- tologist. Some people have a knack for spotting suspicious shards. Others—intelligent and well- meaning though they may be—amble forward oblivious to jutting femurs and vertebrae. Discoveries come easily at the newly opened


NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM OF UTAH in Salt Lake City (nhmu.utah.edu). Randall Irmis, curator of paleontology, is a rocks-and-bones guy,


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