Once at Natural Bridge, we find out that it’s basically a driving park. Not too much in the way of hiking, which honestly is good. It’s hot as balls out and we’re both pretty exhausted from yesterday’s adventures. We got water, chatted with the park staff, and began our driving tour. We stopped at some cool arches, took some pictures, then went on our way. Seriously, if you were going to go out of your way to visit just this park, don’t. What is it with people and being in love with arches and land bridges??? We don’t get it…
Driving out of Natural Bridge and through Bears Ears again, we stop a few more times at easily accessible locations. One is Salvation Knoll, which is tied to early Mormon explorations. When they were building roads for Mormon passages to the Southwest, a survey group got lost in the dead of winter. A trip that was supposed to take 8 days took like, 23 days. With the last of their food, the men climbed a knoll to see if they could figure out where they were. Alas, Salvation Knoll got its name, as the men were able to navigate back to the others with this new vantage point.
Also on our drive was another Kiva known as the Butler Wash ruins. This was an easy mile walk to an area that overlooked more Anasazi ruins. Not anything you could walk in like Perfect Kiva, but still cool to see.
At this point, we’ve been in the woods for a few days, and we’re looking for some actual food. We roll into Blanding, UT and find that there are actually restaurants here! We pop into a country style burrito shop (don’t ask questions, just roll with it) and I eat so much food it hurts to move. Typical. After eating too much, we peruse a visitor center and plan out the rest of our day. Looks like we’re headed to Canyonlands National Park. Just so you know, there are three districts to the park. The main attraction is accessible out of Moab and is known as The Island in the Sky district. The southern district is known and The Needles district, and the western section is The Maze district. Just based on the name and on the description from Edward Abbey “Desert Solitaire,” The Maze district sounds right up our alley. Super remote, no facilities, and these huge rock fins that make massive maze-like hikes that either connect to other paths or dead end into canyons or rock cliffs. But…. There is like, a 4 hour drive to get to this section. We can’t justify the crazy additional drive time unfortunately. So we settle for the next best district of The Needles. Less visited than the Island in the Sky, and still promising cool features and hikes. We hop in the truck and head out. On our way, we stop at a cool site known as Newspaper Rock. This was a rock face with lots of petroglyphs visible from early residents. Was it a warning to other tribes? A way to communicate with other travelers? Perhaps the youth were just really bored? Who knows. But it’s pretty cool to see now and ponder.
Driving up to Canyonlands was as expected. Red rocks, desert landscape, and a few private ranches with huge watering systems in place. The visitor center was closed when we arrived, so we grabbed a map and did a Jen/Kristi run tour of the park. One of the coolest hikes consisted of an old cowboy camp from the early 1900s along with a natural spring and some Anasazi paintings. The rocks here are eroded to look like mushroom tops or toadstools, leaving circular overhangs around the structures. Definitely looks like a Super Mario level. Kristi loves the toadstools for some reason…
Next, we went to check out Elephant Hill which is supposed to be a super intense 4×4 trail in the park. It’s described as the most technical 4×4 trail in the state of Utah. Yeah, I’m not trying that out, just want to see it. But as we get closer, I start to worry about if there’s going to be a spot to turn around. So I bitch out and leave early. Don’t feel like getting stuck anywhere so late in the day. Instead, we opt to find a park campsite and do a hike into the back country.
The hike we did left out of the campground and ended up being beautiful. The scenery is extremely open and has tons of slickrock structures to give the view depth and color. We hike 2 miles out then turn around and head back to camp. Time for a fire, cocktails, and Lore podcast!
The night ended up being great! Beautiful out, even though the stars weren’t too amazing. The moon is starting to get bright again, so our stargazing will be limited for the next few weeks. When we woke up, it was already warm. Man the sun is intense here… We took the early light to tour a few more sections of the park, and then headed to the visitor center to question more park employees.
We pull up to the visitor center and walk in to find a pretty empty room. We find an employee and begin our questioning of the soil crust. Kristi and I are mesmerized by the crust and want more information. Like, if hikers can’t walk on the crust because it kills the cyanobacteria (very sensitive to foot traffic), what impact do all those cows have that BLM lets graze its property? Apparently it’s a huge impact. The crust acts as the glue that holds Utah’s red dust together. This keeps red sediment from becoming airborne during wind events. With the crust gone due to cattle, shitty hikers, or other soil disruption events, this red dust is ending up all over the place. Mostly in Colorado. In fact, they are seeing a direct correlation to red dust ending up on snow in Colorado snow packs, and earlier melt times due to the dark color, which leads to heat absorption. Normally the white snow reflects sunlight, but this new red cover is changing all that. Who would have anticipated that… Probably not BLM.
We ask this park employee about crusty, the fun cartoon we have been seeing in some places telling us “Don’t Bust the Crust!” He’s fun, informative, and succinctly tells visitors to not bust the crust. I connect with crusty on a personal level. We find out from this employee that crusty has been discontinued as the higher ups think he’s too juvenile. I don’t agree, but I understand. We leave the visitor center and head towards the other, more popular district of Canyonlands, Island in the Sky. To do this, we have to drive through Moab, then back west to the park. There are only a few bridges across the Colorado River, so that really limits how you can get around out here.
After a few hours of driving, we end up at Island in the Sky. We stop into their visitor center and get some intel from a super helpful employee. We got about 3 hikes lined up and a few overlooks that are good views of the park. Also, we signed up for a permit to take Shafer Trail, a 4×4 trail that cuts down the face of a canyon and traverses along the Colorado River to Moab. Once we have our permit and hike recommendations, we fill up with water and head out to our first hike.
Hike #1 took us to upheaval dome, a cool little slick rock trail that overlooks some green sediment upheaval. No one really knows how the upheaval happened, but there are some theories. I don’t remember what the theories are… But they do exist.
After that short hike, we did another short hike to Aztec Butte to see an Anasazi granary. This was basically a storage facility for these Native Americans, maybe because they were traveling and needed a stopover, or maybe it was to just hide food and water in storage to keep it away from rival tribes, no one really knows. But it was a cool area, with an awesome view. We hung out for a bit then trekked back to the car.
The last big stop on our park tour was the Green River Overlook. The park district gets its name because it sits on a large mesa that overlooks the rivers below (The Colorado and the Green River). Looking like an island in the sky… We stop here, take some pics, then head out to Shafer Trail. This trail is stupid intense. It’s literally straight down for about 3 miles. I’m in 2nd gear, but my breaks are still smoking up a storm. You can’t go over a few miles per hour due to the small shitty dirt road conditions and hairpin turns. Cas calls me while I’m making my way down. Which actually worked out to keep me from being scared on this drive. Once we got down the main canyon wall, it was fairly smooth sailing from there.
We passed herds of bighorn sheep, awesome river overlooks, and a salt drying facility on our drive. Kristi also wanted to stop and dip her toes in the Colorado. This 35 mile-ish detour took about 2 hours to complete, but I think it was worth it. We roll back into Moab around 6 and make a pit stop at the Moab Brewery and Distillery. Utah is so damn weird. Ok, if you want to sit in the restaurant, you have to order food in order to order a beer. Or, you can sit in the tavern, which is only 21 and up, and just order drinks. Two totally separate rooms in one restaurant. We choose the tavern side, sit down, and order beverages and food. So much food that we both can’t move from the hurt of overeating.
After rolling out of the brewery, we decide to stop at a few of the touristy shops along the main Moab drag for Kristi to buy shit. I try to talk myself into getting a t-shirt, but I just can’t. Once we were done shopping, Kristi decided we needed one more beverage before heading to our campsite. We try to find a local’s place and came up with McStiffy. A hole in the wall joint that had a hole in the wall feel. We sit down, but apparently chose seats next to a guy who showers even less than we do. The smell is overwhelming… We finish our drinks quickly and head out to our campsite near Arches NP.
Pulling up to our camp area was as expected. An open area of desert where people have been parking at. Nothing fancy, no frill, nothing. It’s hot, windy, dusty, and now very sweaty in the truck. I immediately pass out, but Kristi is kept up by another truck that pulls into camp right next to us. The area to camp at was no joke, about 3 acres. A large area. This truck decides to park directly next to us. So the only 2 trucks here are within 20 feet of each other. I sleep through everything, but Kristi is apparently freaking out. Eventually she realizes they have a kid and are just trying to camp for the night… Still kind of creepy.
In the morning, we are woken up by our next door neighbors. They are blaring reggae music at 8am, a 2 year old is wandering around, and a little yappy dog is yelling for no apparent reason. Plus, they are smoking weed, and it’s stealing all of our clean air. We get dressed super quick, brush our teeth, and bolt out of there. We need to do laundry anyway, we’ll just go to town and get coffee there. Anything to get away from these weirdos next to us. We do laundry, get coffee, and head out to Arches National Park. One that has been on my list for a long time!!
