Saturday, November 14/2015

We are headed to Arch Canyon Trail today.  It will be a good trip down memory lane as we were lucky enough to do this trip on a Jeep Jamboree and have nothing but good memories from this.

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We headed down the wide graded road and took in the spectacular scenery that surrounded us.   The sun was shining and it was a good day to go for a scoot.   We travelled through varied terrain of sand and loose rocks and made several crossing over a wash that at one time had water in it.  The trail looked like Arch Canyon but there were a few things that just didn't add up however, it has been about 20 plus years since we have been on the Arch Canyon Trail and perhaps our memories were not what they used to be!!

Sandy trails and large cottonwood trees

One of the many caves that dot the landscape

We travelled about 10 miles up into the canyon and knew that this was definitely not Arch Canyon Trail but continued on until we were finally stopped by huge boulders that had fallen from the face of the surrounding cliffs.  It was time to turn around.   All was not lost though as the trail did throw us a bit of a challenge in some spots so it was all good.

A photo opportunity.  It doesn't look steep but it was on quite
an angle!!

Lots of loose rock

We never saw any creature (other than cottontail
bunnies) but the tracks were there!!

Shelf Trail

We made our way back to the wide graded sand road and headed up a shelf road.  We knew this definitely was not Arch Canyon Trail but one always wonders just what it at the end of each trail. We had exactly 1.2 miles of shelf trail to do and it took 30 minutes to go that far.  I know because we had to come down the same trail and I took the mileage and recorded the time.  We got to the top of the mesa and had a refreshment break, did a few extra miles along the top then decided to head back down.   Oh brother!!  Not my favourite trail but John was in his glory!  All I kept thinking was "just get me off this bloody mountain in one piece"!!

You may not see it but there is the skeleton of a car
beside the rock......nasty

Looking down at the shelf trail we just came up

The trail was nothing but rock in some areas

Once we reached the top of the mountain, this was the view from
there.

We came up from down there

Headed back to camp

We did indeed get down and once again were safely on the wide graded sand road.  It was  getting late but we tried one more detour and low and behold......there is the sign to greet us to Arch Canyon Trail.   God dammit, we had passed this spur earlier on in the day!!  Like I said earlier..... the signage on these trails leaves much to be desired.
We headed down this trail for about 3 miles then turned around and headed back to camp.  The canyon is surrounded by very tall sandstone cliffs and gets very little sun in the evening so it was noticeably cooler now.  We did notice that last night's frost was still on the ground and there was ice on the water!!  Yikes!!
We decided that instead of watching the football games tomorrow (WHAT!!) we would ride the Arch Canyon Trail!!
Once back at camp, I got supper ready.  We watched some TV and John uploaded the pictures from today's ride.   Hogan was happy to be chasing a few cottontail bunnies so he had his evening's entertainment before coming in and curling up on the bed.  Life is good!!

Friday, November 13/2015

It was chilly this morning and that was no surprise as it was chilly last night when we arrived. Hopefully there are no issues with the pump freezing!!
We are headed to the Arch Canyon Trail today and the sun has started to shine and the chill is slowly burning off.
John went to get the side by side out of the trailer and found that the throttle cable was not working properly so that kind of put a damper on our ride.  I guess we are headed to a repair shop instead.  John did wonder if the cable was frozen and I found that hard to believe as it just wasn't that cold out.....was it?
We packed up the camper and headed down the trail to find a spot to turn around as it was a pretty tight squeeze to turn the truck and trailer around at the site.
With that being done, we stopped to check that everything was OK in the trailer and John took one more stab at the gas pedal and low and behold, the damn thing was now working!!  What the hell......perhaps it was frozen!!
We decided to pick a new camp spot across the road where there were less trees so we could get more sun on the solar panels and have less interference with the satellite dish.  I must say, we have been pretty lucky with the way that dish and the Internet have been working.  This is kind of good as we have been in a non Cellular Service Area so at least we can still communicate through Messenger.

Our new spot for a few days

Time for a fire

Great evening

Once we got settled across the road, it really was too late to go anywhere so decided to have a stay at camp day and that was awesome.  John managed to find some wood and we had a great fire while our supper was cooking.  Mmmm....great food.  Life is Good
Tomorrow we will once again attempt the Arch Canyon Trail!!

Thursday, November 12 /2015

Leaving the campsite

Today we are heading into Moab and travelling a bit further South.  We stopped to pick up some gas, dump the tanks, take on some propane and water and pick up some groceries.  Once that was done, we were once again headed South.  It would not be a long drive today as  Blanding is only about 75 miles from Moab and our campsite is only 14 miles outside of Blanding at a place called Comb Wash.
Because we took longer that expected in Moab, we were getting a bit of a late start so it is a good thing that it is a short trip.  When we went through the town of Monticello, there was a sign along side the road saying that there had been 427 collision with deer so far and encouraged motorists NOT to be #428.  There were numerous warning signs saying that deer were in abundance and we actually seen one huge herd of deer standing in a field grazing.  As we passed several more signs warning of the deer danger, John noticed one standing on the side of the road.  Well, not knowing what this stupid thing had in mind and also knowing how unpredictable they are started slowing down.  Well, this stupid thing bolted across the highway directly in front of us and I just do not know how we managed to miss it.  I swear the Good Lord must have picked the dumb thing up and eased it to the side of the road because I was sure we had hit it!!  I looked out my window and saw the thing scooting up and over the hill!!  Man....what a relief as neither John, myself nor the deer wanted to be #428!!
We managed to get to the campsite without any further excitement and settled in for a quiet evening.  Tomorrow, we are hoping to do some of Arch Canyon Trail.

Between those trees was our last camping spot

Dewey Bridge

US Highway 128 . traveling along the Colorado River

Autumn colors

Colorado River

The Colorado River as it cuts its way through the canyon.

Snow capped La Sal Mountains and Colorado River

Incredible scenery

Never gets tiring looking at this

Leaving Moab - heading to Blanding, Utah

Snow on the ground

Sunset as we get to our new spot, we will park and find a site in the morning