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| >> May 2013 >>> Southern Utah national parks, part 2 (click for part 1)  Capitol Reef National Park, UTCapitol Reef was a revelation. Unlike Zion, Bryce Canyon, and Arches, I hadn't heard of it before researching this trip, but it has as much if not more to offer than the others in this unbelievable chain of parks. The long straightaways of Highway 24 leading toward the park passed through still more alien and impossible landscapes, and it was hard to believe I'd just been in a snow-covered forest. Capitol Reef is a series of buttes, cliffs, and canyons in and around a 100-mile-long bulge in the earth's crust called the Waterpocket Fold. It's a "geologic monocline" (basically a seismic wrinkle on the earth). The formations are among the craziest I'd seen yet, complete with crumbling tops and slides that might have happened last year or thousands of years ago. For perspective, the big toppled boulder in the center pic was the size of a car. Trixie was not impressed by such things, but she enjoyed posing on the sun-warmed shale and blending in with the scenery.    Most of the walls and formations feature stripes of different rock layers, and many of them are on diagonal slants. It gives the whole area a dizzy psychedelic look, and also boggles the mind when you think about the magnitude of the forces that created all this. Again, click for a larger version of the left pic below to get an idea of the scale we're talking about here.     Entering the park proper, I got a spot at Fruita Campground, site of an 1880s Mormon pioneer settlement, with several restored buildings from the time. The campground is incongruously located in a grassy area amid apple, peach, pear, plum, walnut, and almond orchards planted by those early settlers, and campers are allowed to gather fruit when in season. The Fremont River runs alongside the campground, and there's a barn nearby with three friendly horses. All this is surrounded by multi-colored, diagonally striped cliffs - the pic to the left is taken from the campground. It's truly an incredible place.There was enough daylight left to explore another aptly named Scenic Drive through the park, so off we went "into the fold" where the landscape was different around every bend.    You'd think I'd be getting immune to bizarre and beautiful red rock formations by now but no, Capitol Reef is something else. Virtually every surface is made up of diagonally slanted color bands, and most are topped off with spires or castle-like crenelations. Narrow canyons take off on the sides leading to old uranium mines and outlaw hideouts, and the more dramatic formations have picturesque names like Golden Throne, Pectol's Pyramid, and Fern's Nipple.   The next day I set out early for the last eastward leg of this trip, but stopped just past the Fruita/Scenic Drive turnoff to see the restored one-room schoolhouse and rock wall carvings nearby. These are technically called petroglyphs, but I like to call them prehistoric graffiti. These ones were done by the Fremont Indians hundreds and hundreds of years ago.  I've always been a sucker for this kind of thing: it's like ancient history come alive in a way that even displays of artifacts can't do. In the case of this panel, it's weirdly similar to the family stick figure decals you see on the back of SUVs. I don't know if that was the intention or not (I'd like to think not), but it's curious. This grouping is quite high on the wall, amid some very large boulders, and is barely visible until you locate them with the free telescope set up on the boardwalk viewing platform - click for a larger version for detail and scale.From there I headed northeast on Highway 24 through still more changing landscapes and fabulous diagonal and striped scenery, and a long, beautiful drive to meet up with Interstate 70.     Arches National Park and Moab, UTI turned south on Highway 191, passed the entrance to Arches National Park, and went on into Moab to find a spot to spend the night. It's a nice town, tourist-oriented, and not too far from the Colorado border. There were loads of campgrounds and RV parks to choose from, but I picked one at the far end of town and lucked out. Spanish Trail RV Park had nice sites, friendly & helpful staff, and wonderfully clean laundry room and showers. I took advantage of both after I turned around to explore Arches NP. It was perhaps the most beautiful park yet, with gigantic towering rock structures and of course, lots of natural arches. In fact, it boasts over 2,000 of them, although many aren't much more than narrow slits. Yet another Scenic Drive led up into the rock and the first turnout for an area called Park Avenue, so named because the giant formations stand all in a row like New York skyscrapers. Farther on is The Organ, a huge monolith reminiscent of a giant pipe organ.    Many places have balancing rocks, but this one at Arches is 128 feet tall, and the balanced-on-top part is 55 feet of that, the size of three school buses. Most of these extra-impressive features have turnouts or parking lots with trails leading to them, but the scenery everywhere is simply majestic. Arches large and small are found almost everywhere you look, and all the formations are beautiful, eerie, and dramatic.     I'm sorry to say I didn't complete the hike up to Delicate Arch, one of the most famous symbols of Utah. It's relatively isolated, 65 feet tall, and its beauty is stunning even from a distance. Click for a large, close-up version.I did hike up to The Windows, gigantic double arches backed by a single one not far away. I was pretty much overwhelmed by then but went on to view areas with names like Devil's Garden, Parade of Elephants, and Fiery Furnace. Even "plain" walls in this park are breathtaking with their endless variety of colors and shapes. Eventually I retraced my route back out of the park and headed back through Moab to my home for the night.    This part of the world has five national parks in a row - count 'em, five! And let's face it, they're all basically collections of big red rocks, yet each is completely different rock-wise, each has many other things to offer, and each is well worth visiting in its own right. I skipped Canyonlands National Park this trip but pictures indicate it's just as majestic and unique as the others. There are also dozens of national monuments and state parks that are just as impressive, and the countryside across the whole area is gorgeous and ever-changing. I highly recommend a trip here to anyone who loves being awed by nature.  The road homeLeaving Moab the next day, I headed back up to Interstate 70 and west to Highway 6/191 northwest, which took me through a series of desert scrub areas and tiny towns, and eventually another hairy mountain drive at 70mph with lots of turns and lots of trucks. It was fantastic driving but definitely a good time to keep your wits about you. Highway 6 led back to I-15, which I'd left a week earlier in the southwest corner of Utah. It took me north to Provo, beautifully flanked by snowy mountains, and then on up to Salt Lake City - and my first traffic jam of this trip - just before turning east on Interstate 80 toward home. If you've ever taken I-80 across Utah, you know there's not much to see. The dismally blank Salt Flats go on forever, broken up only by the utterly random 87-foot sculpture titled Metaphor: Tree of Life that flies by in a blur. Day turned to night and I crossed Nevada, wondering if I'd make it all the way back to the SF Bay Area in one go. I'd done it before, once from central Utah and once from Idaho, but I ended up napping after 750 miles or so at a deserted rest area just east of Reno instead of pushing on.    The next day I was on the road very early, weaving over the Sierra Nevada at high speeds. I made a quick stop at cold and snowy Donner Memorial State Park just past the California border to pay homage to those oh so intrepid travelers who didn't have the easy driving and fantastic roads we take for granted. It's hard to see the park's statue with the early morning sunlight behind it, but I love how the pic came out. You can see a more detailed version of the statue here. The 22-foot tall pedestal indicates the depth of the snow during the 1846/47 winter when dozens of pioneers, including many children, were stalled here on their trek west by particularly harsh weather and starvation, after being needlessly delayed for weeks by a supposed short-cut they'd been advertised into taking that turned out to be a brutal route and deadly mistake. Overall, 39 of the 90 members of the group didn't make it, and most of those perished here. The inscription reads "Virile to risk and find; kindly withal and a ready help. Facing the brunt of fate; Indomitable - unafraid." Bless those hardy folks for what they endured to seek a better life. Read more about the Donner Party here. And then I was home, before noon, having covered 2,200 miles and countless unforgettable sights in under 10 days. I had warm sunny days the whole trip, even in places with snow on the ground, and I didn't get a single drop of rain anywhere - pretty good for a March roadtrip! As always, thanks for visiting the site and traveling along with me. |
entries latest october/november 2013 ~ brannan island, pinnacles march 2013 ~ capitol reef, arches, moab, donner march 2013 ~ virgin river gorge, zion, bryce, anasazi january 2013 ~ pinnacles, peacocks, omelettes, lassen june 2012 ~ burney falls, death valley, turkeys may 2011 ~ delta, eucalyptus, redwoods march/april 2011 ~ diablo, morgan hill, delta, chabot february 2011 ~ sundial, shasta, river road, delta, olema january 2011 ~ columbia, chabot, diablo, preparations much more to come, hopefully low frills I'm not set up for comments, blogrolls, profiles and the like, but please follow and/or talk to me on Twitter. I'm also on Facebook but it's pretty much focused on my Big Brother site Hamsterwatch, and anyway, I prefer the short attention span aspect of Twitter follow me on Instagram where most of my travel pics show up in a timelier manner than they do here  about me I believe the essence of a person is what counts, and that comes out through words, actions, and creations, not vital stats. Also, since I'll be on my own out there on the open road, I'm not real keen on making myself too visible. Suffice to say I'm a crotchety, intuitive, decrepid old lady who's equally appreciative of life's basics and its complexity. I like unicorns, rainbows and long walks on the beach reality tv, documentaries & unique movies of all types, memorable fiction, being awestruck, and nature's majesty. I do financial transcription work as well as running websites of my own and for a few clients. Serial killers fascinate me. I have an adorable little papillon dog but I only make her wear clothes on special occasions. Or when it's very cold. Good Sam RV Parks: Top rated parks across the country. Listings on over 2,100 RV parks!  Classic and seasonal favorites from See's Candies |
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