On the first night we arrived in Moab, Utah we camped in an empty State campground without paying and left promptly in the morning with Will still asleep in the back. I then parked at a nearby rest stop for breakfast and had a hard time explaining to a group of rangers (who despite the huge car park parked right next to us) that we hadn’t actually slept there overnight. This is while Will with unkempt hair crawled out of bed on the other side of the car. After an awkward breakfast next to the rangers who were getting ready to do some track maintenance we moseyed down the road to Archers National Park. The clouds and freezing temperatures were quite the contrast from the hot sunny weather others had promised would be waiting for us. Wrapped up warm and about to start our first walk of the day I discovered my shampoo had leaked all through my bag and threw a wobbly. Eventually I got over it and we walked down the soggy red clay paths to Balance Rock. That afternoon we wandered through some tight canyons towards Broken Arch before returning to the car to find Scout had had some fun with the free park newspaper by tearing it into a million shreds. He however looked rather remorseful when we opened the door.
We camped in the park campground that night for $20 and went on one more walk up to Skyline Arch as darkness fell. Dinner was something unmemorable but for dessert Will was attempting to make a rice pudding; he had the rice soaking in milk while we a watched movie. During the movie I took my jacket off and pushed it onto the shelf forgetting about the milky rice that then fell onto our feet and all over the bed. Will wasn’t happy. We salvaged what we could and it tasted quite good but we defiantly needed to do some laundry given my shampoo covered clothes as well. The next day was again cloudy with rain showers but we got amongst it and visited several other arches. Will was determined to get some good photos so in the hopes of the clouds opening up for sunset we trudged through the rain to see the famous Delicate Arch. By far one of the most stunning arches, it sits on the side of a huge multihued bowl. As our teeth chattered away the clouds came to the party for the briefest moment. That was all it look for Will to get one of the most dramatic landscape photos of the trip. Back at the car we decided to return to Moab and do some much needed laundry.
At the laundromat we met the usual ‘interesting’ people but also I got talking to a guy after seeing he had some climbing gear. It turned out he had come back into town for a wash after being at the local highlining canyon known as The Fruit Bowl. He was going back in a few days for the annual gathering over Thanks Giving called 'Gobble Gobble' and invited us to come along. It sounded good so we decided to head there closer to Thanks Giving which was about five days away. That night we asked the owner of the laundromat if we could camp out the back and he happily agreed. It turned out to be a pretty sweet deal for us as it had toilets and fast wifi. We spent the evening chatting on Skype to friends back home.
We felt a bit lost the next day unsure of what we wanted to do given the weather which now had snow in the forecast. We checked out a climbing store for a while and had bacon and eggs at an old school diner for lunch. We also check out a rock climbing wall right on the side of the highway called Wall Street. We really wanted to do some climbing but the weather had other ideas and was going from bad to worse. Finally as snow began to fall we called it quits and checked into the amazingly cheap $29 Motel 6 that had recently been refurbished. It turned out to be a good decision as eight inches (Moab’s entire annual snowfall) fell that night. I even got to relax and watch TV while Will braved the weather to get pizza’s for dinner.
We felt a bit lost the next day unsure of what we wanted to do given the weather which now had snow in the forecast. We checked out a climbing store for a while and had bacon and eggs at an old school diner for lunch. We also check out a rock climbing wall right on the side of the highway called Wall Street. We really wanted to do some climbing but the weather had other ideas and was going from bad to worse. Finally as snow began to fall we called it quits and checked into the amazingly cheap $29 Motel 6 that had recently been refurbished. It turned out to be a good decision as eight inches (Moab’s entire annual snowfall) fell that night. I even got to relax and watch TV while Will braved the weather to get pizza’s for dinner.
A peep out of the window in the morning revealed a marvellous blue sky and a dusting of snow. We pulled our warm gear back on and returned to Archers NP. First up we hiked the Landscape Arch trail which included a chilling windy walk to Double O Arch. We lunched in one of the picnic areas and dined on our new favourite meal of fried eggs and mayo on a toasted bagel, though our little camp toaster we brought back in Chile was on its last legs. Afterwards we drove down the four wheel drive road to Eye Of The Whale Arch. Leaving Scout in the car once more we followed the trail to the arch which in itself wasn’t that impressive as at 4:30pm it was already in the shadows. However the lighting of the setting sun against the red rock, white snow and tufts of green bush was magnificent. I sat and took it all in while Will being Will commandoed over some more rocks to find the best photo location and captured some awesome shots. Back at the truck with the fading light we continued down the 4x4 track sliding at times until it eventually it exited the park. Here we set up camp and cooked dinner while Scout ran around ignoring the cold and possible threat of Coyotes.
In the morning we planned to head to Canyonlands National Park by continuing down the 4x4 road. This turned out to be an adventure in itself as the road was a sticky muddy red mess that even with the 4x4 working Will struggled to keep us going in a straight line. It was fun for a while until we got alarmingly close to getting stuck and it dawned on us how not fun getting out of the car would be. After sliding sideways through a cattle stop we made it to the end and the Dodge was officially the dirtiest it had even been. We made the short drive on the highway with mud flinging everywhere to Canyonlands and headed to the visitors centre. A ranger kindly let us fill up our water tank out the back and told us about the 100mile White Rim Trail. We couldn’t decide if we wanted to do it as the main road was closed and we would have to drive quite far to the other entrance. Instead we left to spend the day checking out the other easy access points of interests such as Mesa Arch. But as the day went on the lure of getting away from the crowds of tourists proved too hard to resist and we hatched a plan to hit the White Rim Trail. We left the park fuelled up and drove to the start of the trail in darkness before setting up camp. The trail would work out well as the other end came out close to The Fruit Bowl highlining area off Mineral Canyon Road.
The next day was a fun filled 4x4 experience along the White Rim Trail and we passed a few other groups also enjoying the canyonous scenery. On the trail we saw what we decided was our favourite arch, named Muscle Man Arch it was about 25m long and only about 70cm thick at the thinest point. We couldn’t believe there were no signs saying not to walk on it or even a railing given the 500m shear drop below. We gathered some courage and both walked over the arch, it was a thrilling spot. As the afternoon wore on we saw less and less people and soon figured that most people had turned around at half way not wanting to drive the steep snowy switch backs we were now driving. Having gained some height we were up in the moist dense clouds for that nights camp but finaly there wasn't a single other person around. The next day we could really see why know one else had driven this half of the trail. The numerous sheer slippery drops right next to the road gave it away. I was glad to be out of the car and filming the ascent for a few of them but we made it through. Once we left the park the road didn’t really get much better in fact other than the paved hill section the flat road was as bad as the road we took out of Archers NP and we were sliding all over the place again. Think red mud covered every inch of the Dodge. (And we are still cleaning it off 2 months later!)
Once we eventually found the turn off for the highlining canyon we couldn’t believe how many nice and low clearance vehicles were there they only had a short drive from the pavement when coming from the other direction but still it was rough going. Despite the foggy, wet, cold that hung over the area the atmosphere was awesome. There were tents scattered all around with a few fire pits and there was a whole other community of car campers back in the car park; everyone was super friendly and Scout helped break the ice. There were about twenty other dogs there and Scout found a playmate. Pretty soon they were chasing each other around and Scout learnt that he was still just a puppy the hard way as he was pushed into a deep icy puddle. He was shivering and muddy red from the clay, I didn’t want to touch him he was so dirty but luckly for Scout some other girls decided to wrap him up by the fire while we chatted and watched the highlinging action. We were blown away by the number of lines they had set up ranging from a 300 foot span to an 8 foot span and the number of people successfully walking them. We felt like amateurs I can’t even walk our normal 2 inch slack line across a 15m gap. We felt inspired for the first few hours and had a go on two of the long lines they had set up only 1-2m of the ground and had a bit of a play on a really short line that was right next to the canyon. Other people walked across it with backpacks and open water bottles for fun on their way to set up camp; meanwhile I wobbled along it gingerly. Scout spent the night chained to the steering wheel to limit the amount of mud inside though I’m not sure why we bothered everything was dirty yet again and we had been without a shower for nearly 5 days.
Even though it was Thanks Giving the next day we threw in the towel and headed back into Moab to our favourite Motel 6. Unfortunately they had increased the price by $10 for the holiday but we didn’t care. Not wanting to get clean while the car was still so filthy we drove to the nearest self-service car wash and looked the part next to all the muddy jeeps and ATVs. Twenty dollars later the Dodge was mostly clean so we had a quick shower then hit town in search of a Thanks Giving dinner. We found a place with a half hour wait and they gave us a paddle and said to go for a walk, even a few blocks away it would ring when our table was ready! So we went to check out some of the huge lifted shoulder height trucks towing ridiculously nice trailers with serious off road jeeps on the back of them. Soon enough our paddle sprung to life and we sat down to a nice hot meal, I went for the traditional turkey, cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes while Will chose the all you can eat pizza option. Cheep buggers that we are we snuck a few pizza slices in to my handbag for the next days lunch.
After a luxuriously clean sleep in our motel bed we were back washing everything at the laundromat before hitting the road due south west for the Grand Canyon.
Rochelle & Will
Rochelle & Will