Utah

We’ve been in Utah for three days now and we keep getting reminded why we like Utah so much.  The scenery is always beautiful.  There’s no such thing as a bad view.  The Mormons may have their theology very wrong but they did do something right.  They settled in Utah, establishing towns that now serve as base camps for all sorts of outdoor activities. These cities have grown over the years into thriving adventure centers.  Moab, for example is a haven to rock climbers, mountain bikers, hikers, off-road drivers, kayakers, and a whole bunch of other -ers that I may not even be aware of.

Moab has grown since the first time Deb and I came out here and fell in love with the surrounding canyons.  Lin Ottinger’s rock shop used to mark the edge of town.  Now the town has grown past his rock shop by at least a mile, with new hotels, restaurants, RV parks, Jeep rental outfits, and more.

We took one of Lin Ottinger’s canyon tours a few decades ago. At that time he used older Volkswagen busses for his tour vehicles because they were durable and easy to fix.  He had a picture of one of his busses parked on top of one of the arches, something that would never be allowed today.  The boys loved pawing through his collection of rocks when we took them out here.

Lin Ottinger is long gone, but his shop is still there and still looks the same.  The town, however is a far different place.

Another cold morning on Comb Ridge Road.  We took a brief look around when the sun came up and then were off towards Blanding, where we got fuel and groceries.  Taking 191 north, we stopped at anything that looked interesting.

Monticello:  I spotted propane here for $3.30 per gallon, so we topped off.  WE’ve been using quite a bit with these cold nights so this should last us until we get home.  Deb also stopped in the visitor center to gather more brochures.

Wilson Arch: Situated right next to the highway, this appears to be a popular place.  At a minimum, you can just lean out your car window and take a picture.  Many people (including us), choose to scramble up the steep slick rock to the arch itself.

Looking Glass Rock:  This looked interesting enough to drive the few miles of a bumpy dirt road.  This was a large rock in the middle of the high plains with a round arch.  Kind of a fun little discovery that you would never see from the highway.

We drove through Moab, marveling how it has changed since the last time we were here a few years ago. Somehow we didn’t plan this right and arrived on a Saturday, when all the weekend adventurers were out in full force.  We just drove through on the way to our next destination, the trailhead for Corona Arch, about 10 miles out the north end of town.  

Potash Road offers a lot of activities, as it follows the Colorado River for quite a few miles.  We passed Wall Street, which is a section of vertical rock faces popular with climbers.  There were a lot of them on the wall today.  Campgrounds, parking areas for ATV use, trailheads: they were all in use today.  It wasn’t very warm, barely into the 40’s, but, as has been said: There is no such thing as bad weather, only inadequate clothing.

The hike to the arch is a fun scramble which even includes chains and a ladder.  One thing that surprised me was the number of people who took their dogs on the hike.  I get the need to take the dog for a walk, but after seeing one guy struggle down the steep chains section, carrying the dog in one arm and hanging on with the other while nearly slipping down the steep slope, it reinforced for me that a dog is not in my future.  I needed both hands to hang on.

There were quite a few people hanging out at the arch, but a good-sized group of them left shortly after we got there.  After a few more people left, we were the only ones there.  We celebrated our accomplishment of arriving at the arch in one piece with a donut.

A branch from this trail also goes to Pinto Arch.  This trail scrambles up some very steep slickrock  to the arch, high on the canyon wall, which looks like a round cave with an open top.  Water was dribbling from one of the layers of rock, and the plant life growing in that area made it look like some sort of hanging garden.

This was a great hike that took us about two and a half hours.  The canyon floor was in shadows when we got back to the RV.  Which made me wonder if the people we met as we were coming down were going to have to hike down in the dark.

We treated ourselves to pizza at Canyon Pizza Co in Moab.  Kind-of nice to enjoy a meal made by somebody else in an actual oven.

Finishing this, we stopped at the Maverick Gas station just down the main street as we read they had a free RV dump station.  They did.  One of the tasks of Deb, the navigator, is to sniff out all the sources of water, all the dump stations, all the campgrounds along the way.  Sometimes they are difficult to find; especially fresh water in the winter months, but she finds them, sometimes in very non-obvious places.  The last fresh water fill was from a spigot in the Sand Island Campground near Bluff, Utah.  We would have never known it was there but for a mention in one of our guidebooks.

Then back through town and a little ways up state route 128 to find a place to camp for the night.  Several campgrounds along this route.  They used to all be free, but now anything within 20 miles of Moab has a $20 fee due to their popularity.  The first one, Goose Island, was full, but we found space farther out at Drinks Canyon Campground.  For twenty bucks you get a wide spot and a fire ring.  But we could easily spend that much on fuel hunting for something better.  We stayed.

We were far enough away from Moab that the light from the city didn’t affect the night sky.  Without any other habitation here, it is dark.  We stood outside and gazed at the stars for a while.  It’s not often we can see so many stars.  I took a long exposure picture.  There were even more stars in the picture than I saw just looking at the sky.