Deserts in Utah, Colorado and Arizona
10/02/2003 - 10/14/2003
Arches National Park is 4 miles north of Moab. Whoever is in charge of lighting in Arches National Park does a great job. The morning light on the red rock is an amazing sight to see.
Utah Deserts
In 1998, visits to Zion National Park and Bryce Canyon National Park sparked interest in the multitude of Utah's national parks. On this trip, we visited Arches National Park, Moab, and Canyonlands National Park. Next time, we will try to visit Monument Valley, Capitol Reef, Natural Bridges and Hovenweep parks.
While in Utah, we read Edward Abbey's books Desert Solitaire and The Monkey Wrench Gang. Abbey served as a park ranger at Arches National Park in the late 1950s. His love of the desert and parks is quite understandable although his fictional ecoterrorism described in The Monkey Wrench Gang is a bit disturbing today.
The Devils Garden Campground in Arches is the most scenic campground we've ever camped in. The animators for the Flintstones and Roadrunner must have used this scenery as inspiration. We spent three nights in the campground.
Erosion and weathering form amazing arches such as the Delicate Arch. To date, about 2000 arches have been found.
Cryptobiotic crust lives throughout the desert. It protects the protects the desert from erosion, absorbs moisture and provides nutrients for plant growth. The motto Don't bust the crust reverberated from every sign and ranger in the park.
Devils Garden Trail leads you between and over sheer red rock walls of sandstone fins. We hiked the 7 mile difficult primitive trail to see Landscape, Navajo, Partition and Double O arches. Sloping slippery steep sandstone challenged us on this hike.
The hike took us over and in between fins such as the ones in this picture. Trails on the slick rock are marked with small piles of rock called cairns. Fins formed from the activity of water and ice causing fissures in the land. Wind cleared out the loose particles leaving fins. Chunks of rock tumble out of the fins to form arches.
By the end of this hike, it was very hot, our water supply was empty, our feet were tired, and Robin's heart was racing from the excitement of climbing on these challenging, fun rocks.
Arches National Park lies atop an underground salt bed. Salt Valley is an amazing sight to see.
Moab is well renowned as the mountain bike capital of the US. A multitude of four wheel drive vehicles take advantage of the fun trails across the slick rock. To support the influx of visitors, Moab has an excellent selection of pubs and cantinas.
The RV sucked the gasoline down as we climbed up and over mountains.
While camping along the Colorado River, the RV provided great shelter during the thunderstorm later in the evening. We offered a couple camping in the tent a respite from the rain, but they chose to tough it out.
The Bureau of Land Management campsites along the Colorado River near Moab offer great views of red rock and water. A few campers rafted down the river even though the rapids were pretty gentle.
Canyonlands National Park is in the heart of the Colorado Plateau (even though it is in Utah). The park is segmented into 3 districts: Island in the Sky District, Maze and Needles. Unlike many national parks, Canyonlands remains very rugged and mostly inaccessible. The Colorado and Green Rivers reach their confluence inside the park.
Island in the Sky is located 36 miles northwest of Moab. The island is a huge mesa with spectacular views.
Looking 1000 feet down from the mesa, a 100 mile four wheel drive road originated as a cattle trail then as a road for uranium prospectors. After visiting Island in the Sky, Edward Abbey wrote "the splendor of the landscape, the perfection of the silence". The silence in Canyonlands was deafening.
One of the many helpful park rangers talked on the geology of the area. Geologically speaking, Canyonlands rocks.
Layers of rock created by streams, rivers, seas, wind, and sediment create quite the Neopolitan ice cream effect with many more than 3 flavors.
There is no camping in the Island in the Sky district of the park, so we spent a night at Dead Horse Point State Park. The point at the park provides a great view of Island in the Sky mesa as well as the Colorado River.
The Colorado (shown here) and the Green River wander through the park until the two rivers merge. The confluence starts a 14 mile area called Cataract Canyon. Cataract Canyon is known as the country's most treacherous white water stretch. As you can guess, this picture is before the confluence.
In the Needles District of the park, we camped for three nights. Several hikes across sandstone rocks and canyons provided lots of fun.
While attending a couple of evening ranger talks, we were treated to watching the full moon rise.
Newspaper Rock is just outside Canyonlands National Park. These petroglyphs span 1000 years and cover 3 distinct periods. Of course, a set of initials and '54 cover the "Graffitti Period".
Fall colors kept getting better and better throughout the RV trip. Check out the aspens in the La Sal National Forest. We drove through this forest on our way from Utah back to Colorado.
Mesa Verde means green table. The large plateau was home to a group of people around 1400 years ago for more than 700 years. Not much is known about these Ancestral Puebloans, but today's Hopi, Zuni, and modern puebloan's are thought to be their ancestors.
Colorado Deserts
Colorado treated us to many surprises on the road trip. Close to the San Juan Mountains, yet so dry and arid, Mesa Verde National Park was our final stop in Colorado for this road trip. In June, lightening started a major fire in the park. As a result, lots of burned trees dotted the hillsides. Even so, the major attractions, cliff dwellings, remained unharmed.
The people of Mesa Verde took advantage of the landscape by building their dwellings beneath overhanging cliffs. Different dwellings show the progression of the building techniques. Cliff Palace is a village of more than 200 rooms.
Is this the first high rise apartment?
Lots and lots of tourists participated in the guided tour of the Cliff Palace. By going on the tour, you get to walk down to the dwelling, listen to a ranger talk, and peer inside some of the dwelling rooms. We did not feel right about walking in the dwelling with two dozen other tourists, so we skipped the tour.
Balcony House is well hidden in the cliff. Tours take you down a ladder into the house. Again, we skipped the tour.
This tower serves as a major lookout station for fires in the park. Nearby devices measure ground temperatures and moisture contents.
Mesa Verde borders the Ute Indian reservation. Access to their casino and RV park is available via a park road. We chose not to visit either the casino or the RV park.
Duncan fondly remembers visiting the Painted Desert as a child. The paint has not worn off. Pastel pinks, greens, red, corals, taupes are among the many colors on the painted deserts pallette.
Arizona Deserts
Arizona is known for its deserts. We did a quick tour of a few of Arizona's deserts. Visits to the Painted Desert, Petrified Forest and Sedona wrapped up the desert tour. In all honesty, by the time we reached Arizona, we were about deserted out.
In the forefront of this Painted Desert picture, some exciting dinosaur was discovered.
Duncan's excitement over petrified wood stumped Robin. In the Petrified Forest, lots of examples of petrified wood display various colors from the minerals.
In the mid-1800s, U.S. Army mappers and surveyors told of trees turned to stone. Then, others came to sightsee this phenomenon. Lots of samples were taken and sold as souvenirs. Tons of signs warn visitors not to take any samples home.
The drive from Flagstaff to Sedona was gorgeous. Forests, canyons and red rock decorated the landscape. A couple nights in river side campground in Sedona completed our road trip.