The Arches

Monday, I drove from Green River to The Arches National Park at 6:00 am. I wanted to see the sun rise and hoped to get some sunrise and arches. Didn't quite, but the sky was quite beautiful.

 I drove to the end of the paved road (at Devil's Garden Campground) and hiked to see two arches. The first was "Tapestry Arch" and the other was "Broken Arch". I found Tapestry Arch (there was a sign) and then tried to go back to the original trail.

 Instead of going back the way I came (the "logical" thing to do), I ended up going cross-country, doing all the bad things the NPS didn't want you to do (first thing is to stay on the trail and not step on the natural occurring bacteria for the desert to regrow). I followed some other footsteps and tried to avoid growing spots, but it took about 20 minutes to actually get to the trail to go to the other arch.

However, I never found the other arch.

I went to the "Devil's Garden" trailhead and took the improved trail to Tunnel Arch, Pine Tree Arch and Landscape Arch. It was a fairly easy hike, only a few ups and downs and was another place I took too many pictures (85 I think). Thank goodness I'm not using film. I couldn't afford the film and the developing!

I'm not sure why this is called Pine Tree Arch, but it is still gorgeous. It is one of the few arches you can get underneath without a lot of huffing and puffing.

The next arch (after Tunnel Arch) was Landscape Arch. This one used to have a trail to stand underneath, until a 300 pound section of the arch fell, almost on top of some hikers. It's been closed since then.

 After that little hike, I drove down to "Balancing Rock". It really looks like it is balancing on the rock beneath. The lower rock has worn away and will probably wear away some more until the balancing rock on top falls over. Not too soon, I hope.

There was a path all the way around, so I did that little hike. That was the end of my adventure in Arches, except for a quick stop at the Courthouse area. The rock structures looked like many old courthouses and there was even a group of four rock "people" standing across the road.

BTW, the road into the main part of the park starts at the main highway into Moab and then makes some very sharp turns to climb up the rock face into the main section. Very dramatic and "let's not look at the view right now" kind of terrifying.

On Wednesday, I drove to Provo, UT. It was an easy drive. I made a quick drive to Heber City (about 25 miles away). More later.

Capitol Reef and Goblins

On Saturday, I drove to Capitol Reef and spent some time there. Most of the interesting stuff is located on dirt roads that are recommended only for 4 wheel drive or vehicles with high clearance. My truck isn’t 4x4, but it does have high clearance. I still didn’t go down any dirt roads. Too messy!

Right off the freeway seems to be part of the fold. If it isn't, it is still fascinating.

CR isn’t a park I had ever heard of, so it was interesting going there. Apparently there is a 100 mile long fold in the earth. It is called “Waterpocket”. It makes some interesting formations.

The layers that show up in the formations are really intriguing. For instance, this formation looks like a messy layer cake. That rock on top looks like it could fall at any moment.

In this picture, the different types of formations have different colors. The hard, smooth stuff near the base look like green-patined copper. Might be. The red may be iron. Wonder if any of these layers are from the time of the dinosaurs, or even earlier. Interesting to think about.

There is also a district in the park called “Fruita District.” There are a lot of fruit trees growing along the river, along with a few old buildings and a farmhouse. They sell fresh fruit “stuff” there, like pies, jellies and jams. I bought a pie. They also have an area that lets you pick your own fruit, when there is fruit of course. Not this time of year.

When I left CR, I decided to go to the Goblin Valley State Park. There was a small area for camping and an overlook to the Goblin Valley. The only bad part (besides the parking which was horrendous) was that everyone was climbing all over the goblins. They probably wouldn’t last long, but the info sign said that old ones were wearing down and new ones growing. I’m sure they were wearing down faster than they were growing new ones.

 There are a lot of differently shaped goblins. Some look like faces, some look like animals, some look like short fat "goblins". Some look like a specific part of male anatomy.

 I took a short walk among the goblins and noticed the shapes and the evidence of them being underwater and then above water with the water lapping at the structures. Really neat!

 The different colors also seem to indicate the different mineral content of the water and the sediment that was deposited over the years.

Wide Open Spaces

Dixie Chicks and Wide Open Space: “She needs wide open spaces, a place to make a big mistake . . .” That’s what I need. I so relate to this song.

 Traveling from Ely to Green River on Wednesday proved that point. Wide open spaces, lots of ups and downs, but it wasn’t as bad as I feared. I decided on Green River instead of Moab and boy am I glad.

I drove through Moab to get to the southern end of Canyonlands National Park Thursday, and Moab is a tourist trap. Every other business is a tour company, an ATV rental place, a motel, a river rafting company, you name it, if it relates to tourism at Arches and Canyonlands, it is in Moab. And the traffic – it was almost like rush hour on the California freeways!

This was a long trip (around 250 miles round trip). The scenery was incredible (except for Moab) and awesome. I met up with some cows on the road to Canyonlands (it is mostly open range). A group were in the middle of the road, so I stopped. They looked at my truck and something about the front of my truck must have spooked them, because the group took off running up the hill. Very funny!

Did a little hiking at Pothole Point and drove down a dirt and gravel road towards Elephant Hill. It was all gorgeous. At Pothole Point, I saw this formation that looked like an eagle flying. It was a quiet, easy walk to see all the potholes. Only a couple had water, the rest were dry. Apparently wierd little critters grow in the water and then bury themselves as the pothole dries. They re-emerge when it gets wet.

I saw a lot of campers going toward Canyonlands (there are several campgrounds), but the road was so awful, I wouldn’t take my trailer out to those areas.

Another formation in the Canyonlands area. Canyonlands is kind of separated into three areas: Islands In The Sky (northern part), The Maze (middle), and The Needles (southern part). These were all taken in the Needles part.

At the end of the road in the Canyonlands area, I saw this bird waiting for dropped food from people in cars. He was very bold and let me get very close to him.

Nevada State Parks Near Ely

I'm writing this on October 11, after arriving in Fillmore, UT. I'm not sure when it will be posted, but here goes.

On October 10, I went to two Nevada State Parks. The first was Cave Lake, then Ward Charcoal Ovens.

Cave Lake is a gorgeous little lake in the hills near Ely. I didn't stay long, because I was planning on hitching up the trailer later in the day, so I didn't want to take too much time. I then went to Ward Charcoal Ovens (WCO).

There are two roads to WCO. The one closest to Ely shows 10 miles to WCO. So I took it. It was the most godawful road. Besides being dirt and gravel, it felt like it had been made by tank treads. It was so rough and beating up my truck so badly, I could only go about 10 to 15 mph. Even then the truck was tossed around and onto some very slippery gravel.

So I turned around and took the other road, farther from Ely. It showed a distance of only 7 miles. The road was so much better, I was able to go 50 mph and got to WCO fairly quickly.

Both places were extremely quiet and with very few visitors. Which made for a nice time.

Traveling to Fillmore wasn't too bad. I really wish that Ziva (Woolibaar Ziva Baaavid) wouldn't sing along with the music. First, she doesn't know the lyrics. A "mew, mew, mew" doesn't do it. In addition to not knowing the lyrics, she can't carry a tune in a bucket and her timing isn't even close to what the song's is. Oh, well.

Ely and the Great Basin National Park

Drove from Elko to Ely on October 8th. Spent the 9th at Lehman Caves/Great Basin National Park. I had last visited Lehman Caves in 1980 - before it became a national park in 1986. The long tour of the caves was full, so I took the shorter tour. It is very tight in some places and necessary to suck in some parts that needed sucking in. The goal was to not touch either side, but it wasn't as easy as that.

However, the stalactites, stalagmites, drapery, popcorn, bacon and shields were all incredible. At one point the ranger turned off the lights and lit a candle (which is how the first explorers of the cave saw everything). In case you hadn't guessed, it was VERY dark.

After the tour, I started the drive up to the top of Wheeler Peak (at 13,000 feet). Didn't make it much beyond 9,000. The road was paved, but there weren't any guard rails. And the drop off was awesome (in a somewhat horrifying, what-if-I-drive-off sort of feeling).

Just a little ways away from the Lehman Caves area was a "ranching exhibit". Someone had decided to put an "art installation" near it, and it was truly strange. A cow skull inside a rusted out car with no axles. How I feel at times!

I was able to get more pictures of aspens near Wheeler.

Another interesting note. On the way to the park from Ely, I went over a hill and down into a valley. I saw the road heading off to the hills on the other side of the valley (over six miles away, BTW) and thought OMG, I'll never get the trailer over that.

Turns out the road actually goes left and follows the hills (doesn't go over until a few miles later). The uphill isn't as bad as I expected when I saw this view out my windshield.

That made me think about traveling in a car versus my current setup. I have driven I-80 from Pacheco to Salt Lake City, Hwy 55 from Winnemucca to Boise and Hwy 50 from Fallon, NV to Ely and beyond. While driving in my van, I didn't notice any hills, or at least they appeared to be minor ups and downs in the roadway, especially with cruise control.

Whole different matter pulling a trailer. What seemed like minor hills turned out to be huge mountains with the truck shifting down to a much lower gear, or slowing down to 35 or 40 mph at a more reasonable rpm. Its a good thing I'm not in much of a hurry!

Just a quick note

Just a quickie - drove from Caldwell to Winnemucca and spent last night in a brand new RV park with really low rates. Clean, unpopulated and with a casino next door! The trees are still so young, they don't make shade for anyone but the smallest critters.

Drove today from Winnemucca to Elko. I was planning on going to Wells, but couldn't get any kind of acknowledgement when I tried to get some info. So here I am in Elko.

One comment about the Nevada Department of Transportation. Every uphill we found, the NDOT had closed off one lane. It would switch from left lane closed to right lane closed in the middle of the uphill. There were MILES of closure with little work being done.

So why were the lanes closed on uphills? Because they can. And they did. Very annoying and I felt sorry for those poor suckers behind me!

Lazy Week

Haven't done much of anything for the last week. I traveled from Cedar City, UT and spent a night in Draper, UT (after a whole trip of rain!). The next night I spent in Pocatello, ID at the Bannock County Fairgrounds.

That was an interesting stay. There was NOBODY else parked there. Nobody. I had the whole place to myself. I made sure my pepper spray was close by, but there was NOBODY there.

I spent one night there and drove to Caldwell, ID. I will be leaving on Wednesday to drive to Winnemucca and will continue my tour until the beginning of November. I will start working at Deer Valley, UT at the beginning of December.

So, I still have some interesting places to visit before then. After April, I'll have to decide where and what I will visit after that point.