Canyonlands

From Wikipedia – This landscape was eroded into a maze of canyons, buttes, and mesas by the combined efforts of the Colorado River, Green River, and their tributaries, which divide the park into three districts. The park also contains rock pinnacles and arches, as well as artifacts from Ancient Pueblo peoples.

• Established: 9/12/1964
• Annual Visitors: 739,449
• Size: 337,598 acres

“Nothing Adventured, Nothing Gained”

(painted on a ruggedly retrofitted 4×4 seen in Moab)

Canyonlands National Park, September 15, 2020

Moab, UT has really been fun. We came here for the Arches and Canyonland NPs but we are exploring and experiencing much more outside the parks too! Moab is a very recreationally based town. With a population of a little more than 5000, Moab is a mecca for individually participating in, and supplying guided tours for, mountain biking, hiking, 4×4 and four wheeling, rafting, climbing/repelling, stargazing (Dark Skies followers), and more. There are music and art festivals held here and the restaurants, coffee shops and lodging are abundant! All is open and bustling with physical distancing where tables are concerned and indoor mask wearing a requirement, but not “enforced”. As I have said, we wear a mask indoors at all times. Moab is very dog friendly on restaurant patios, in town, at many of the hotels and lots of people, with a dog or not, eagerly wanting to pet Rangeley!

We are staying at Aarchway Inn (yes, 2 A’s), just north of the main Street of Moab and very close to the entrance to Arches NP. The grounds of the hotel are lovely with lots of grass, a pavilion with a gas grill which we have already tried out, a nice fenced-in pet area, kid’s playground, basketball court, and a hiking trail on Bureau of Land Management property that sprawls freely behind the hotel all the way to the Colorado River. They have a coffee shop, gift store, onsite laundry (yay!), bike storage, a pool, hot tub, and more. It’s been a pleasure to stay here three nights as we have been doing lower budget hotels all week ($60-$80/night). But the nightly rate of $150 here is still decent for Moab and for what we are getting, inside and out. See pics.

This morning we did a hike that we all loved! Mills Creek Trail starts just south of town. It followed along a stream, through trees, ending up at a 30 feet water fall into a 6-7’ deep pool currently. Rangeley was in his element swimming in the “pool” and jumping in and out of the stream anytime he could! See pictures. (If you are ever taking this trail, take note that when you come to the small mill & dam you’ll see a sign stating no mountain bikes past this point…go past/behind the sign and follow the stream. There was a bit of a fork there that was slightly confusing.) There’s a short traverse over a rock ledge along the stream and then flattens out. You can walk through the stream instead if you wanted to. We crossed the stream three or four times at ankle high water arriving at the falls just about one-mile into the out and back trail. Gary said he didn’t know who was having a better time, Rangeley or me!

After a short regroup at the hotel we headed to Canyonlands NP, about 30 miles away.  The first stop was, of course, our picture at the NP sign which we always post at the top of our journals. Then to the visitor center to get a commemorative pin, post card, maps of the park and any trail and sites directions as well as clarifications on the dog rules. Not a very dog friendly park : ( This park store was totally open…no window shopping or pointing to what you want from single examples and paying through a portal. The store did have a designated entrance and exit to encourage a one-way flow and of course mask wearing was mandatory but the whole store was open.

The approach road to the park is about 20 miles long with many overlooks and pull offs to take pictures. This park is only attended ½ as often as Arches! Like most of the Arches, there is no services in the entire park…outhouses, yes, but no food or water available. The long approach road vs being right off the highway might be one reason (?).  We went prepared with our 7-gallon jug full of water and brought snacks.

Canyonlands is similar to the Grand Canyon in that it has huge walls of eroded stone with the mighty Colorado River at the bottom (as well as the Green River in this case); pictographs/petroglyph, cacti, desert flowers, big horn sheep, rafting opportunities, and camp sites just like the AZ Canyon. The Grand Canyon is much larger. See pictures in this blog.

The park was about 82 degrees and Moab was 95 degrees.

A “No travel” day: September 16, 2020

We took a fabulous walk to Corona Arch. The drive is 12 miles outside Moab with the Colorado River on one side and sheer cliffs raising on the other. There were climbing tour groups ascending right at road’s edge and rustic camp grounds for just a few tenters at each turn off. The trail crosses a railroad track and heads up a total of roughly 400+ vertical feet over the 1.5-mile, one way, out and back walk. We walked on dirt, red sandstone sand and very large boulders. At one point there was a short steep, cable strung and foot holds in the rocks climb which, with harness handle in hand, Gary and Rangeley did flawlessly!  Then came a 5-rung ladder… which Rangeley and Gary were able to circumvent… and there were views that encourage you to sit and contemplate.

Corona Arch is made of Navajo sandstone with an opening of 140’ across and 105’ tall! We took many wonderful pictures, some of which we added to this journal. We began our hike at 8:15AM (sunrise is after 7AM right now) The people we met were from all over the US… retired, Millennials, dogs and kids. The photo of us together, with Rangeley, under the arch was taken by a guy roughly in his 50’s who told us he repelled from the top of the arch about 5 years ago! If you zoom in to the center and top of the arch, you might see striations made from the many ropes over the years. Due to popularity and some serious injuries and a death, you can no longer climb on the arch.

We returned to the hotel around 10AM for a day of rest before heading out to Capitol Reef NP tomorrow.