69 And 70 in Utah

Day 69: Red, green, white, rippley, archey rocks all over!

I wake up a little after 7. I want to get some breakfast, which ends at 9 and get going pretty early so I don’t get in too late. I shower and make it to breakfast with plenty of time to spare. Ugh, my bangs are getting long again. I don’t want to cut them though. I always cut them too short! 

I check out around 9. Sweet, earlier than I thought I was going to be able to manage. I head off down the road. Not 10 miles into my trip, I go to pass a Dodge truck. They swerve wildly into my lane and I go onto the shoulder to avoid them. WTF was that about dude?? They then take the next exit. Lameos. At least I was paying attention to avoid getting hit. And lucky for them hitting my horn is the last thing I am going to think of.

I continue uneventfully down the road for a while. I notice the road signs and names of places: Silt, Rifle, No Name, Parachute. Interesting names for places. Colorado people seem to have a sense of humor. Some of the signs at the ski resorts have been pretty humorous too. I also notice that gas prices are way higher the further I get from Denver. I don’t know if gas is just more expensive now or if it is regional. Probably both. I plan to stop in Grand Junction, the last decent size city before I hit Utah to get gas. Hopefully the prices won’t be too terrible.

I reach Grand Junction. I decide to wait a few exits in to stop. I read the food and gas signs. OH MY GOSH they have Chick Fil A!  Apparently they are all over now. Maybe I will stop getting excited about them. I take that exit. The Chick Fil A is 4 miles off the highway and it is only 10:30. Oh well, I don’t care. I order the chicken sandwich. They are just switching over to lunch and it will be a short wait. No worries, I don’t mind. I wait for 10 minutes or so before I get my food. Yayy!! They guy feels bad I had to wait so long and tries to give me some sort of coupon. No, that’s ok, I probably won’t be back for years…. There is no Chick Fil A where I live. And seriously, I don’t mind the wait.

I get some gas for $3.59 on my way back to the highway. I miss the 3.20 gas…. Oh well, it’s only going to get worse! I get back on the road. I am taking a slight detour to Arches National Park on my way to Escalante where Chris lives in the winter. Right before the turn off, a prairie dog goes running across the highway. Never seen a while prairie dog before. And I manage to avoid running over it. Sweet!

I make the turn off and drive toward Arches National Park and Moab. Wow, these are some cool rocks. And there are off road trails everywhere! This could be fun… If I had someone to go with. I don’t want to go on any major off roading trips without someone to pull me out if I need it…. I make it to Arches a short time later.

Just drivin around

The road to get into the park winds up a very steep cliff. It is pretty sweet. I drive along the road and pull out at some scenic routes. I stop at one of the trail heads and do some hiking around some arches. I get some pretty sweet close up views of the North and South Window Arches. I climb right inside one of them.  I see several other arches on my hike. The rocks here are so pretty!! I drive a little further into the park to catch a glimpse of Delicate Arch, the famous one you always see in pictures. It is a mile and a half hike to get right up next to it and I want to be getting a move on. Looking at it from afar is good for me! 

Balanced rock in Arches

Arch!!!

Purdyyy

North and South Windows Arches

On my way out, I find an off road trail. I drive down it a short ways before coming to a gate. I think I can open it and go through it but I decide to turn around. I backtrack 40 miles to the interstate and am on my way again. 

Really, pictures do more justice than me trying to describe all the pretty rocks all over. There are red rocks and white rocks. There are “balanced” rocks (where a big chunk of slowly eroding rock sits on a thin spire of faster eroding rock), monoliths, and just huge massive rocks. There are mesas and mountains. One of the cool things of Arches is that there are deserty rocks all over and in the distance there are snow capped mountains.

As I drive down the highway, I ponder why I don’t like this desert-scape as much as the one in South Arizona.  The desert around here is similar to the ones in Nevada, California, and Colorado. None of which I really like. Utah does embellish it with some pretty awesome rocks though! I conclude it is the color. While Arizona is very arid, it is still somehow green. You look across the hills and see all shades of vibrant green all over. These other places, it is all brown. I mean some plants are greenish, but they are all tinged with grey or brown. All of the color in the rocks can’t make me feel any better about the lack of green.

The drive today is pretty cool in general. I drive through canyons, over mountains, along big rocks, and through forests. I notice that Utah roads seem to be in worse condition than the Colorado roads. I do pass two crews crack sealing though. At least they are trying to keep the roads in good condition.

Anyway, I make the turn off the interstate onto the state road that will take me through the middle of nowhere to the small town I am going through. The first part of the road is pretty flat and straight. Hmmm. I wonder where this truck tops out…. I hit the gas and then realize I am going uphill. I top out at 95. Not bad. I try again on a slight downhill. I get to 103 on my GPS before things start feeling squirrelly. Ok. That is enough for now.

I don’t know exactly how far I am going to be driving in the middle of nowhere. I know Escalante is in the middle of a lot of national parks, monuments, and forests. I stop and get gas at the next turn off. Ugh, $3.89. Well, it is better than being stranded. I head off again and give Chris a call. ETA is 6:30. See ya soon! 

The wind starts to pick up and the road starts to wind. The rocks are pretty sweet. The wind gusts that blow me into the other lane or onto the shoulder are not. When will this wind stop!?!

I eventually enter Capitol Reef National Park. The road is really cool and goes by some beautifully shaped and colored rocks. Some of the rocks are even green. I try to take pictures while I am driving.

After exiting Capitol Reef, the road begins to climb. I soon find myself at an elevation of 9,000 feet.  There are trees everywhere and snow on the ground. I am also amused to find cattle crossing signs. This does not look like a cow friendly place. Oh well, I will watch for cattle. 

Capitol Reef

I encounter no cattle however, I come upon a deer standing in the middle of the road. Movveee!! It finally does. I descend some out of the mountains to a more normal elevation. Now entering Escalante Staircase National Monument. This place is full of white rock formations. I drive back up to high elevations and along a ridge before winging along the sides of mountains and rocks. I pull out in one of the scenic view points and take a few pictures of the view. And my truck. Offf course!  I see no traffic anywhere. I hop in my truck, check for traffic and go to pull out. Someone is honking at me. What the hell, where did you come from?!? I totally just tried to pull out in front of you. You were not there when I got in my truck and must have been in my blindspot when I checked… I feel bad for pulling out in front of you but I sure am happy you were paying attention and didn’t hit me…. And where diddd you come from?!!?

Anyway, I have 30 more miles to go. The rocks stay pretty spectacular. I pass a sign that says 14% grade next 4 miles. Wow. 14?!? Is that even legal? I mean 8 is usually considered pretty extreme. I fail to see any grade that I am convinced is 14%. 8%. Maybe.  I pass another sign that says 14% grade. So it was not a mistake…. Interesting. The things I notice….Anyway, today, I have driven through mountains, flatlands, crazy rock stuff, and forests. I think that is a pretty good mix of environments. 

I pull into town and follow my GPS. It takes me to a street, not a house. Ughhh, Daniellll!! Fail!  I check the address I am looking for and start cruising around the neighborhood. Some guy waves at me. Oh, it is Chris!  Yay! I found it! His son, Rowan comes running out to greet me. Uhhh, what do I do with kids?!?! Should I hug him or just say hi or…?  I go with say hi. It seems to work. Chris is my boss from the last few summers and Rowan comes into work sometimes. And I spent some time trying to teach him how to swim last winter. Apparently I was not too scary and he likes me!

Anyway, Chris is working on painting his house. He asks how the drive was and such. He then mentions dinner. Yay food!  His wife, Justine, and younger son, Hawthone then come outside. Hello Hello! I get a tour around the house. They have cows literally right next door!  Apparently there are some younger guys who live over there and practice roping cattle… Maybe I will get lucky and get to watch that while I am here!  Rowan is all into nature stuff and shows me some ant lion hills in the yard. He even gives me a demonstration of how the trap works. Not bad for a 5 year old. Actually, pretty impressive.

We decide to order some pizza from one of the two places to eat in town. This is a really really small town. Two restaurants that are only open seasonally depending on tourist traffic, a gas station or two, etc… Justine’s sister is out of town so I am staying across town (a while half mile away) at her house. Sweet!  They take me to the house and show me around. Looks like it will work for me! Oh, and I don’t need to worry about locking the doors. Apparently they even leave the keys in the car… Wow. Awesome. Regardless, I will probably lock my truck out of habit….We pick up the pizza and head back to their house for the evening. 

Sunset!

The pizza is quite tasty. Hawthorne, who is 1, seems quite interested in me. He keeps pointing at me and making faces at me. I make faces back and he laughs. After dinner, he is allowed to explore on his own. He comes over to me and is fascinated with my keys.

I bring all of Chris’s stuff in that I have been carrying around. His snowboard that I picked up in Portland, some glasses I got in Lake Tahoe for them as a thank you for letting me use your timeshare, the speaker wire, and some beer I had gotten for them. Apparently you can’t buy any good beer in town… I guess it is that small. I get a tour of the house. It is a work in progress. They only live here a few months of the year and there is some pretty extreme remodeling going on here. What is done is looking good though!

Hawthorne likes my keys

They start putting kids to bed and I figure that is a good time for me to head out. I check out the stars on the way out. They are amazing! I guess being this far from city lights will do that. There are stars everywhere. Ya know, I guess this is what they looked like to the ancients with no city lights at all to mess up the view.  With this many stars out, the constellations might actually make sense….

There is some sweet hiking to be done around here, as well as national parks to explore, and maybe skiing to be done. I have a few days to relax and do some exploring before heading toward home….

This post will be wayyy better when I get some pictures up too…. J they are comin!!!

Day 70: Utah Rocks… Literally

I wake up around 8. Chris had said something about breakfast at 9. I guess I should get up and drive the whole half mile to his house. Orrr I could go back to sleep. Tough choice… food or sleep. Since it is morning, I pick my default option of sleep.

About 9:30 I actually get up. I put in my contacts and drive over. Chris is finishing his breakfast. Good morning!  He offers to cook some eggs and such for me. I won’t object to that!  Escalante is kind of a farm town… which is nice since all the produce is fresh. They have farm fresh eggs picked straight from the chickens. Yum!! 

I eat my breakfast on the front porch. The rest of the family is outside.  Hawthorne is again quite interested by me. He crawls over to me and starts inspecting my watch. I take it off and give it to him to play with. He looks at it for a few seconds before throwing it on the concrete. Shoulda seen that coming. Oh well. I have had this watch for over 10 years and have not destroyed it myself. It has seen worse. I put it back on. He keeps looking at it. I take it off again so he can grab onto it. I don’t let go this time to avoid having it hit the concrete again. He tries to throw it again. I guess hanging on to it is a good idea!

The house, right by the cows!!

They are planning on going to Posey Lake today to collect rocks and look at nature. That sounds like a fun time. Chris leaves to get a rock gathering permit and I shower. This is some nice water… Arizona and Colorado had soft water. I am not such a fan. This seems like hard or at least less soft water. I go to get out of the shower and one of the cats is in the bathroom. It is looking like it is going to start rubbing against my leg… which is soaking wet. No no no noooo kitty. Back!  It stays back until I put my pants on. I then attack it with petting which it thoroughly enjoys. It purrs so much it almost falls off the toilet. Silly cat.

Chris and Justine pack stuff up and make lunches. I offer to help but my help is unneeded. The cows next door are on the near side of the pasture so I go to look at them. Rowan follows me. Justine comes outside. She lets me know that I can go in the pasture and walk up to the cows. If they were dairy cows, I could pet them. Since they are beef cows and are only really handled by people to get shots, branded, or slaughtered, they are a little wary of people. Rightfully so. She tells me that when I get too close, they will just run away. I spend some time chasing the cows around. They moo and I take a video of them mooing. Yeah, super cool.

Rowan kind of follows me out but is not too into cow chasing. He soon wanders back into the yard and wants to show me something. He is all into the nature thing. Bugs, rocks, dirt, animals… kinda reminds me of myself at 5 years old…. He wants to show me something he found. I wander back to the yard and look at all of his discoveries.

A little later, we are ready to go! We all pile into their Chevy truck and set off down the road. The start of the road is all of a half mile from the house. Soon, we are out of town and the road turns to gravel. Posey Lake is an alpine lake. As we drive, the road gets wetter. The dirt around here is so fine that it is quite easy to get stuck in if it is wet. Luckily, we don’t get stuck. We go a little further and the road gets snowy in places. We make it through the snow patches with progressive difficulty. Finally, we get stuck. Chris is able to back the truck down the hill out of the snow patch. Yay gravity!  Unfortunately, we are now stuck between two snow patches. The one in front is impassable. The one in back is manageable… just not going in reverse. There is not really enough room to turn around either.

He eventually gets the truck turned around. The process is very slow and the truck gets somewhat stuck in the middle of it. We head back down the road. We had seen little trails all along the main road on the way up and decide to take one. We decide to scout the raod before going for it and potentially getting stuck. Getting stuck would be manageable butttt with a 1 year old on board, dealing with a stuck truck would be even more of a pain in the ass than usual. The road looks pretty good. There is an initial creek crossing. We check out the creek for rocks before going back to the truck.

We all pile back into the truck and drive along the road for a while. We had initially thought that it would lead us to some pretty rock cliffs. Instead, it snakes around and starts heading back up the hill we had just almost gotten stuck on. It starts to get snowy and we decide to turn back. 

The road

On the way back, Justine spots a spire on the opposite hillside. We stop to check out the area. I decide to climb up the hill for a closer look. Rowan decides to follow. Ohhh no, I feel mildly responsible for this kid. Ok, you go first so if you fall you at least fall on me and maybe I can catch you. And every time I take a step I send a shower of dirt and rocks down the hill. I would rather not have that falling all over you!  We make it to the spire with no problems. Chris takes a picture of us from the road. 

The spire

I decide to take another path down the hill. I go first, again, so that if he falls, maybe I can catch him and to avoid showering him with rocks. He complains that I am going too fast. Oops. Sorry Rowan! I spend a lot of time climbing around on rocks and have gotten pretty good at it. I certainly can’t rock climb or anything, but jumping around large rocks up and down hills I can do. We eventually make it to the bottom, everyone unscathed. Yayy!  Justine has found some cool rocks on another part of the hill so we follow her. We all wander around for a bit until Hawthorne gets unhappy. Justine takes him back down the hill.

Chris then finds a very large cool rock that he wants for his yard. Umm, want some help with that?  We carry the huge rock down the hill with Rowan following, asking to help. Thank you for the offer butt this is hard enough to coordinate two people at the moment. There are trees, shrubs, and large rocks all over the place. Don’t worry, give it a few years and I am sure you will get to help your dad carry more rocks than you want all over! 

Anyway, we drive back down the road a little further before stopping again. We find a wash with lots of rocks and sand. I find a nice rock to lay down on. The sun feels nice!  Chris wanders to the spot. “Did someone order a beer?” Um no? Is there beer?  Apparently he had brought some. Sweet. I then lay on the rock in the sun with a beer. Even better!  

The sand bed

Rowan decides he wants to lay in the sun next to me... in the sand. Ewww, I don’t like being sandy. I actually hate having dirt, sand, or anything of the like on me. I barely tolerate sand at the beach. As soon as I leave the beach, my feet need to be clean and free of sand. Ironic how my job consists mostly of me playing in dirt… I do have nice boots and gloves to keep my hand and feet dirt free. Mud, on the other hand, is super fun and I have no problem having it on me. When it dries out and becomes dirt is when I have problems….

Anyway, Rowan decides to take of his shoes and socks and fill them with sand. He suggests I do the same. No, no I most certainly do not want to do that. He wants to know why. I don’t like sand on me!!! Justine is amused that I don’t like sand or dirt but work in a dirt lab. Chris has already heard all of this from me at work and is not surprised. Well, I like dirt and sand… just not on me.

I spend the next bit of time being mildly concerned that Rowan is going to get excited and dump sand all over me. He doesn’t. Yay! Chris is busy picking out rocks and loading them into the truck. Justine is busy watching Hawthorne who has just discovered Chris’s empty beer bottle and is trying to pour it into his mouth. She quickly grabs the bottle before he is successful. About this time, everyone decides it is time to head off.

We take the long route back through the cow, horse, and sheep pastures. Apparently there are baby sheep around. Unfortunately, we are unsuccessful in finding them.  We get back to the house and Chris starts preparing things for dinner. He needs a few things from the store and decides to take me to “experience a small town excuse for a grocery store”. We arrive. Well, it is definitely small and does not have a huge selection of things… I end up finding abd buying some chocolate milk. That sounds good at the moment…

We get back to the house. It is still too early to really start dinner. I had seen there is a petrified forest nearby. I inquire about it. Well, it is all of 5 miles from the house. I decide to check it out. I am still not over missing out on the Petrified Forest National Park. The state park here claims to have the best petrified wood… well the so does the national park, and probably any other place that has petrified wood that I have yet to hear about. I let them know I should be back in about an hour and if that will be a problem with dinner or anything. Nope! 

I head off down the road and a few minutes later have found it. It is a small place. A parking lot, a campground, and a hiking trail with a single spur off of it. Good, I won’t get lost! 

I walk along the trail. The first part is very steep. Switchbacks along the side of a cliff. There are signs all over warning that it is “extremely strenuous”. I get to where the trail kind of levels off about a half mile later. That wasn’t that bad.  Camelback and the Grand Canyon trails were a lot longer and steeper. Oh well, I guess they need to cover their bases. I walk a bit further and find a petrified log. I walk a ways more and find a few chucks of petrified wood. I continue like this for the duration of the hike.

This is not quite what I had in mind when I heard “Petrified Forest.” I was thinking there would just be petrified wood lying around everywhere. I guess at one time this was a forest. Most of the wood probably did not end up petrified though… Regardless of my misconception, the petrified wood is beautiful. The colors are vibrant with reds, yellows, and white hues being the most predominate. A few logs even have crystalline stones on them.

Petrified log!

45 minutes later, I am back at the parking lot. I had seen a dirt road from up on the hill and decide to check it out. I drive along for a while. Nothing challenging. I then turn around a bend and hit a large sand pit. I make it across, not problem. The road starts turning toward the main road. Excellent. It then begins to get difficult to find where the trail is. The road goes up some very steep hills. At the top, I can’t see over the hood to what is under me at all. I don’t like this at all. Eventually, I lose where the trail goes completely. Okkk. Time to turn around and go back. I sure did not get far on this… Oh well. I do conclude that my truck is pretty darned capable off road though.

A little over an hour after my departure, I arrive back at the house. Dinner preparations have begun. Want any help? Nope. I guess Chris has seen enough of my cooking attempts over the last few summers… He and Justine do show me how to make refried beans. 

Dinner is enchiladas. They are pretty tasty. Hawthorne is not a happy camper. It is getting close to 9 and he is tired. Chris and Justine put him to bed while I watch a movie with Rowan. A little later, it is Rowan’s bed time. Awww, I wanted to know how this movie ends!  Oh well, it is supposed to rain tomorrow afternoon so I guess we will have plenty of time to finish it.

Justine has told me about some really cool hikes through slot canyons that I want to check out. (Should get some sweettt pictures here!) Chris thinks that if we head out around 8 tomorrow, we should be able to beat the weather. Soooo… I am getting up bright and early tomorrow to do some hiking! (yayyyy?)