Utah/Arches National Park

Sunday, Mar 17

We knew that today would be a long hard drive.  We got up early (before the times when generators are allowed to operate in the park) and moved the motorhome to a parking lot, started the generator for coffee and breakfast, then got on the road.

It was a day of extreme diversity on the road, from dry, arid desert, to 8,000 foot snow covered mountain passes, to roads through sheer cliffs, down the longest, steepest descents we've seen, and crosswinds up to 40+ mph with a sandstorm.

Sand storm

Finally, settled in Moab, Utah

All this made for a couple of tired campers when we pulled into a very nice RV Resort in Moab, Utah.

The first thing we did was change into bathing suits and hit the hot tub and swimming pool for an hour of relaxing and soothing sore, aching muscles.

Monday, Mar 18

We could not decide until the last minute whether to go to Arches National Park or Canyonlands National Park.  It's unusual to have two great options of National Parks to visit.  There is no way we could do both in one day, and we chose Arches.

What a treat!

Although not as spectacular as some of the other National Parks we have visited, this is well worth the visit.  The geology of the arches and their spectacular setting make it a very special place.

Arches National Park reminds me of a term "geological years" that I have heard to describe many of the features of the Western US.  I think in terms of "human  years".  When I think of changes to the landscape that I view, in our lifetimes (human years), we may see a rock fall or a piece of an arch fall.  However, the arches, along with  the other spectacular geography that we see today in places like Arches can only be viewed in "geological" years.  They may have been formed over a thousand years, a million years or a billion years.  It's impossible for me to comprehend "geological years".

Mimi balances Balanced Rock in her hand!!!

Balanced Rock! But you have to wonder for how long - another million years or next week.  The rock that is balanced on top is 55 feet high.

Mimi in the arch waving to me

Looking up at the arch from beneath it.  I just know it's going to fall - someday!

These arches are called "The Windows"

The Wolfe Family lived in this isolated cabin in what is now Arches National Park from 1898 to 1910.  It is hard to believe that they could have survived in this harsh, desert environment.

This is the most spectacular arch in the park.  It is 306 feet across, bigger that a football field.  Only a few years ago, a 60 foot rock slab fell out of the arch.  Someday, it will all be gone.

This is a very old tree that is fighting hard to survive.  The green limb behind Mimi is the top of the tree, and the trunk of the tree is in front of her.

The Happy cameraman

We saw this sign "after" we had walked under a bunch of arches and balanced rocks.

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For Anna and Evan:  Water and ice, extreme temperatures, and underground salt movement are responsible for the sculptured rock scenery of Arches National Park.  On clear, blue-sky days like today, it is difficult to imagine such violent forces - or the 100 million years of erosion - that created this land which has one of the world's greatest densities of natural arches.  Over 2,000 cataloged arches ranging in size from a three-foot opening, the minimum considered an arch, to the longest, Landscape Arch, measuring 306 feet base to base.  

Today new arches are being formed and old ones destroyed.  Erosion and weathering work slowly  but relentlessly, creating dynamic landforms that gradually change through time.  

Change sometimes occurs dramatically.  In 1991 a rock slab 60 feet long, 11 feet wide, and 4 feet thick fell from the underside of Landscape Arch, leaving behind a even thinner ribbon of rock. 

The park lies atop an underground salt bed that is responsible for the arches, spires, balanced rocks, sandstone fins, and eroded monoliths of this landscape.  

Thousands of feet thick in places, this salt bed was deposited across the Colorado Plateau 300 million years ago when a sea flowed into the region and eventually evaporated.  Over millions of years, residue from floods, winds, and the oceans that came and went blanketed the salt bed.  The debris was compressed to rock, at one time possibly a mile thick.  

Salt under pressure is unstable, and the salt bed lying below Arches was no match for the weight of this thick cover of rock.  The salt layer shifted, buckled, liquefied, and repositioned itself, thrusting the rock layers upward as domes, and whole sections fell into the cavities.

Faults deep in the Earth made the surface even more unstable.  As the salt's subsurface shifting shaped the Earth, surface erosion stripped off the younger rock layers, leaving what we see today.

Zion National Park

Friday, Mar 15

NOTE:  For those of you that are following our journey, you may look at additional pictures which we've uploaded.  We could not, by any means, use all of them in the blog.  You should be able to see all the pictures at the following link.

https://plus.google.com/photos/103547083335306738471/albums#photos/103547083335306738471/albums

We've settled into a large park near the South Entrance (the main entrance) to Zion National Park.  It's only drawback is that we are boon docking - no utilities. We had forgotten that it's a weekend, and for the first time in a long time, the park is a little crowded.  But we got a great spot.

After several days of constant travel, we've decided to stay put for at least two days, maybe more. It's quite exhausting to get up every morning, get everything ready and drive a couple hundred miles in a relatively complex machine, then set up camp again that evening.  Plus it takes constant attention to keep this 30,000 pound bus on the road.  We need a break.  At this rate, I'm not sure when we'll get back to Spruce Pine.

Clara needs a break!

For about the first time since we've been on this trip, we ate dinner comfortably outside on the picnic table.  It is quite warm - and there is NO SNOW.  The temperature should be in the high 70's or low 80's tomorrow.  It's been a while since we've seen these comfortable temperatures.  We've got no specific plan other than to see some of the beautiful sights.

Saturday, Mar 16

Clara made the comment today that "I've given out of adjectives to describe what we have seen". Sheer cliffs that reach 2 to 3 thousand feet straight up in the sky. Rocks with layer upon layer of beautiful colors. White mountains, red mountains, green mountains, black mountains. It's all here, and in beautiful excess.

We started the morning with a slow drive up Zion Canyon. Every curve brought majestic new views. It was hard not to stop and take another picture, and another, and another.  We ended up with over 200 today.

At one point we even took a picture out of the sunroof because that was the only way we could see the cliff because it was straight up right beside the road.

It's impossible to capture the magnitude of the cliffs next to the roads.  This picture was taken through the sunroof looking straight up.

After enjoying this ride,  we took another road which takes us through a 1.1 mile tunnel. We had considered taking the RV on this road and going to Bryce Canyon National Park, but the park service requires a lead car, and they have to stop all traffic while the motorhome goes through the tunnel because of our size and height. After driving through it in the car, there wasn't much question that we are going a different route in the motorhome.

The rock layers go in many different angles.

We were fascinated that the scenery could be so different on the tunnel from from that in the canyon.

After taking in as much as we could absorb, we went out of the park into the Gateway Town next to the park and had an open air lunch at what was once a gas station. Great Mexican food.

After some ice cream at another stop, Clara had to go back to a store we had briefly visited yesterday afternoon. She wanted a Wind Sculpture that a local artists makes. It will fit well in our yard in Beaufort. I don't think it would last very long in the 90 + mph winds at Spruce Pine.

Clara's new Wind Sculpture

After all this, we still had time for our first bike ride on this trip. We've either been too busy, it's been too cold, or too hilly. We've dragged the bikes around for all these miles, and it was nice to be able to get on them and ride for a while.

Tonight we've enjoyed a campfire (again a first for this trip).

For Evan and Anna:  Anna, much like what you've said many times when we are at the mountain house - "The mountains never change but they change every day".  That applies dramatically to Zion National Park, and many other places here in the West.  Everything in Zion takes life from the Virgin River's scarce desert waters.  Water flows and solid rock melts into cliffs and towers over millions of years.  The landscape changes as canyons deepen to create forested highlands and lowland deserts.

A ribbon of green marks the river's course as diverse plants and animals take shelter and thrive in this canyon oasis.

North of Zion, rain falling on the 11,000 foot-high Colorado Plateau races downhill, slices Zion's relatively soft layers, and pushes its debris off the Plateau's Southern edge.

Long before today's landscape even appeared, streams, oceans, deserts, and volcanoes deposited thousands of feet of mud, lime, sand and ash.  The immense pressure and heat of accumulating sediments turned lower layers to stone.  Later underground forces uplifted the Colorado Plateau over 10,000 feet above sea level.

Rain water then worked the Plateau's minute cracks, loosening grains and widening fractures - and eroding the Plateau into today's mighty canyons.

These processes continue, rivers still deposit sediments that turn to stone, earthquakes still punctuate the Plateau's upward journey, and erosion pries rockfalls from Zion's seemingly unmovable cliffs.

Eventually, in millions of years, this beautiful canyon will melt away and others will form.

All it takes is time.

The mountains never change, but they change every day.

We're thinking that we'll head toward Arches National Park tomorrow.