Tuesday 9/28   If you have never traveled Scenic Utah Hiway 12, then put it on your list.  The Hiway goes from Capitol Reef NP to Bryce Canyon.  We only drove to Boulder, but we plan to do the other end after we get to Bryce.  The road goes over Boulder Mountain (9600 ft) and has several switch backs (called Hogbacks here), but it is not a scary climb or descent.  It gains elevation slowly and gently, which gives you plenty of time to enjoy the scenery.  This is the perfect time to travel that road.  The aspens were really putting on a show.  I never realised that there were so many shades of yellow and gold.  Sometimes when the sun hit them just right, it looked like someone had turned on halogen lights in the grove.  So gorgeous!

At Boulder we found the Anazasi State Park and museum.  It is a park that has ruins from the Anazasi Indians around 1000 AD.  It has been partially excavated and opened to the public.  They think that at one time there were around 200 people living at this site.  They have found 160,000 artifacts from this site, so far.  It is called the Coombs Site (after Ephriam Coombs).  Funny name, huh?

We had lunch at the Burr Trail Grill and then continued the loop back to Capitol Reef.  However, in the end, we really wished we had gone back over Boulder Mt instead.  Burr Trail began as a paved road and we accidentally found a beautiful slot canyon to explore.  We would have passed it by except we saw some other people hiking back to it.  So we did, too. Even though there is no sign (I think the locals are keeping it a secret) it does have a name, The Singing Canyon.  Some call it The Cathedral.  Both names fit.  You could hear the wind singing through it and you felt like you were in a cathedral.  Beautiful!

That was the last good part of our day.  After the canyon, Burr Trail became a washboard gravel road that led to the most horrifying road that we have been on yet.  It led down (way, way, WAY down to the bottom of a mountain.  It was very narrow and had NO shoulder,10% grade, crumbly edges, and 7 very tight switchbacks ( the 7 Deadly Burr Trail Switchbacks)!  Did I mention falling rocks?  Then the road became worse.  If it wasn't for having to go back up the deadly frightening mountain road, we would have gone back the we way we had come.  We continued on to Notam Road.  Only 30 more miles to go.  Well, Notam Road had been washed out in places after the last rain. There was a warning sign saying to have food and water, and know that emergency services were a long way from there (hmmm).  We had to drive through the creekbed in places.  And, always, the washboards and washouts.  Thankfully we had a 4wd truck.  We were traveling about 10 mph most of the way.  We were so glad when we FINALLY made it back to the hiway and on back to the campground.  Whew!  Utah has some crazy roads.

Saturday 9/24  Today we left Earth and we were transported to an alien planet called Goblin Valley!  Seriously this place looks like something from a sci-fi movie.  In fact, scenes from several sci-fi movies have been filmed there.  The main area does not have trails.  You just walk down the hill and wander among the hoodoos, or goblins.  It covers about 100 acres in the main area.  I was laughing as we walked through them because it is so incredible.  This place is nothing like anything else we have seen.













We almost didn't go because it is about 90 mi.
from where we are staying.  Fortunately we decided that we didn't have anything else to do.  If you are ever in this area, don't miss it!  On the way out of the park we also saw some unusual striated cliffs that were beautiful.

Thursday 9/22  We have visited all of the famous big attractions in Moab.  So today we searched out a couple of the more obscure and lesser-known ones.  Hunter Canyon Trail was the first one.  As with many of the sites in Utah, the road to the canyon was pretty dicey.  At first it was a nicely paved road that ran along beside the Colorado River.  But then it became a narrow, steep, dirt, uphill road with a particularly tight hair-pin turn and then a very steep descent into the bottom of the canyon.  Yikes!  When we finally found the trailhead, we really enjoyed the hike.  It was a shady easy hike along the canyon floor.  There was some uneven terrain and we had to cross the creek-bed a few times (it was dry), but it was not too strenuous.  The cottonwood trees created pretty tunnels to walk through and the canyon walls gave us shade.  Other than having to drive back out, it was a pleasant hike.

On the way back to Moab, we found another lesser-known hiking trail called Moonflower Canyon Trail.  This short hike (half-mile) leads up a shady cliff-lined box canyon.  The trail passes eight primitive campsites along the way to a small pool below a waterfall.  However, the stream and pool were dry today.  But it was still a nice hike through more cottonwood groves.

Just outside of Moonflower Canyon are the Moonflower Canyon petroglyphs.  More ancient history.  I am loving it!

Tuesday 9/20  Today we headed for Arches National Park, the most famous of the national parks in Utah.  It has the world's largest collection of natural sandstone arches, over 2,000 cataloged arches.  But it also has an astounding amount of balanced rocks, towering fins (thin vertical slabs of rock), spires, domes, petrified sand dunes and rock formations that inspire your imagination.  Everyone sees something different in these unreal structures.  We saw elephants, Russian Cossacks, Santa Claus, the Three Kings, and many more, too numerous to mention.  The Rangers said that water and ice, extreme temperatures and underground salt movement is responsible for the creation of this amazing  rock scenery.  On a clear day you can see 100 million years of history there.  There were also many International people to visit with, French, German, Japanese, Canadian.  We even visited with a couple from Holland!

There are many hikes available at Arches, ranging from very easy to very difficult.  We stuck with easy to moderate.  The moderate one we did was a half-mile nearly straight up, sandy path,  over and around boulders, some stone steps, some slickrock, to view the Delicate Arch.  I was really sucking wind by the time we got to the top of that one! And then we had to go back down!

My two favorite arches that we saw were the Double Arch and the Sand Dune Arch.  Both involved some hiking, but nothing as strenuous as the Delicate Arch Trail.

Double Arch

Delicate Arch

                    

Did I say sucking wind!!!

Sand Dune Arch

                                                                                         

Yes, I fit!

              

Skyline Arch

                       

Unbelievably, there was a disabled Civil War soldier, John Wesley Wolfe and his son Fred settled there in the late 1880s.  We saw the weathered log cabin, the root cellar, and corral of the ranch they operated for nearly 20 years.  What a harsh life that must have been.