Monday July 9
We successfully survived the week of the 4th of July, and are ready to deal with plain ol' regular summer crowds. Today was a travel day with our destination being Capitol Reef National Park. We traveled scenic Utah 12. At Escalante we visited Escalante Petrified Forest State Park. UT 12 took us across the northern edge of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument (the only national monument managed by the BLM; thats a whole 'nother story), along the Hogback, a narrow ridge with steep drop-offs on either side of the highway and across Boulder Mountain at El 9600'. Dorcas was sucking and hissing at every turn. It probably didn't help that I was taking pictures while I was driving. We by-passed several forest service campsites and decided to shoot for a site in the national park. We found a good site in the Fruita Campground and weren't disappointed. Fruita CG is located in historic Fruita, a Mormon settlement established about 1880. Brigham Young sent settlers out to the remote corners of Utah to "...make gardens, orchards and vineyards, and render the earth so pleasant that when you look upon your labors you may do so with pleasure, and that angels may delight to come and visit your beautiful locations." They certainly succeeded at Fruita. Located in a canyon on the banks of the Fremont River and Sulfur Creek, it is an excellent place to grow fruit. There still exist 22 orchards of peaches, apricots, pears, cherries, plums and apples, now managed by the NPS. Visitors can eat all the fruit they want as they walk through the orchards. If they want to take some with them it's $1.00 per pound or $8.00 per bushel. We enjoyed apricots and peaches.
Tuesday July 10
Today we did some hikes in Capitol Reef NP.
Our first hike was from the Grand Wash up to Cassidy Arch a strenuous hike of about two miles. Cassidy Arch is named for Butch Cassidy. Local lore claims that Butch Cassidy and his gang hid out in the area, although there is no evidence to support this fact. Later we hiked on out into the Grand Wash to the Narrows, a slot canyon in the Grand Wash. This was a relatively easy hike except that the surface is deep sand. Finally we hiked into the Capitol Gorge, another hike along a slot canyon with a wash bottom.Capitol Reef is so-named because 1) it encompasses the Waterpocket Fold, a one hundred mile long buckle in the earth that represented a formidable barrier for early settlers and travelers, as a barrier reef did for early mariners and 2) the large monolith dome of white Navajo sandstone, that resembles the nation's capitol building in Washington. We had almost decided to skip Capitol Reef NP, because it was not on the most direct route to Moab, and I had not heard much about it. Ultimately we decide to visit here, primarily because we wanted to drive UT 12. I'm glad we did. It was a pleasant surprise.
We set out a humming bird feed at the campsite and were very successful at attracting hummers. At one point there were 8 hummers on the feeder. This was pretty exciting since the feeder had only three feeding stations. Kinda like musical chairs in fast-forward. Humming birds can be pretty testy. We saw some hummers that are not common in the east, including the broad-tailed, black chinned and the rufous.Wednesday July 11
After spending two nights at Capitol Reef NP we traveled to Moab. UT 24 is a stark change from UT 12. It is straight and flat. We actually drove on an interstate for about 30 miles, for the first time in about 2 weeks. At Moab we are staying at a private campground, Moab Rim Campark, about two miles south of town. It's pretty cushy camping: full hook-ups with cable TV and wireless wi-fi. 50A electrical service means we can run both A/Cs, the microwave and the coffee maker all at the same time. Not bad for $13 per night. I spent some time in Moab 18 years ago, and it has changed quite a bit since then. When I was here before it was a small town with little development. Then you could cross the street without looking and not worry about getting run over. Now the main drag is five lanes. Like many other places, it has grown up and gotten commercialized. They are building a Wal-Mart.
We hiked up to Delicate Arch,
the trademark arch in Arches National Park. On the way up we saw some folks huddled around a man on the ground who was obviously in distress. There was a park ranger about 50 feet away, but she was doing nothing to help the poor guy. Something was not right here! As we got closer we saw the cameraman. It turns out they were shooting an educational video on safety in the desert parks. The man, who was decked out in the gaudiest of tourist garb and a pork-pie hat, was feigning heat stroke. Or maybe he twisted his ankle and fell, I couldn't tell. When we arrived at Delicate Arch it was overcast, but the sun broke through just before it set, allowing for some good photos of the arch. The film crew arrived and we learned that the cameraman did not have enough water and was becoming dehydrated. About this time a thunderstorm was approaching from across the La Sal Mountains. We got some really good views of horizontal streak lightening and decided it was time to get off this mountain. Ironically, the guys shooting the safety video stayed behind and kept shooting, even though the cameraman could hardly stand up in the strong wind. Maybe they were improvising and shooting a scene about thunderstorms. That evening it rained lightly all night, the first rain we have seen in weeks.Thursday July 12
Natural arches are not unique to Arches NP, but it does posses one of the highest concentrations of arches in the world, with over 2000 cataloged arches. Today we did a number of short hikes in Arches National Park, visiting several of the more popular arches. Later in the afternoon we took a three-hour ranger-led hike through the Fiery Furnace, an area of fin-like ridges and slot canyons. This area is closed to hiking, except when accompanied by a ranger.
Friday July 13
Arches NP is a very charming park. Everywhere you go there are wonderful features and sights.
We drove the length of the park road three times and never tired of it. Every time we saw something new and wonderful. It is one of the most primitive parks I have ever visited. Water is only available at the visitor's center at the entrance to the park and at Devil's Garden CG, about 18 miles into the park. The only electricity in the park is at Devil's Garden CG, and it is produced locally via photovoltaic array with generator back-up. The solar arrays feed banks of storage batteries that can power the campground services through four sunless days. Today we hiked the Devil's Garden loop trail, a primitive trail about 6 miles long that goes to some of the more remote arches. It also goes by Landscape Arch, one of the longest natural arches in the world, at 306 feet long, and only six feet wide at its narrowest point. Early on we saw a mule deer cow with her calf. Later we saw the same pair in a different canyon. Later we hiked to some more arches. I think we have seen 1997 of the 2000 arches, and that's enough. Tomorrow we go to Canyonlands NP.
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