After driving across Utah and over a week of camping, I really needed a shower. I checked into a hotel in Grand Junction and got cleaned up, then spent a couple days exploring town and doing some work in the library. When I left a couple days later, I was ready to start my tour of Colorado, starting with Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP.
Lake Powell
Coming out of Capitol Reef, I intended to head straight to Grand Junction, right on the Colorado/Utah border. However, I took a wrong turn in Hanksville and ended up on 95 South driving towards the Arizona border. I realized my mistake when I saw signs for Lake Powell. I had heard about it and really wanted to check it out, so I made the executive decision to go check out the lake. I camped out on some BLM land the day I got there and rented a kayak first thing in the morning the next day with the intention of exploring some of the slot canyons that Lake Powell is so famous for.
I set out feeling a little ill due to the heat and the glare off the water, but after an hour and a couple liters of water I felt a lot better and fell into a groove. I checked out Lost Eden Canyon, and paddled down one of its arms until it got too narrow to continue and the water ended.
The paddle back was much more painful than the paddle out, and by the time I got back to the van I could barely lift the kayak. When I checked a map later, I realized that I had paddled close to 8 miles! My arms and shoulders were sore for days afterwards.
Capitol Reef National Park
After my detours I headed into the one park in Utah I had yet to visit - Capitol Reef NP. This park had a slightly different vibe than the other ones I had been to. In the center of the park was the historic Mormon frontier town of Fruita, and due to the NPS mandate to protect stuff of historic value, the old orchards, schoolhouse, and cabins are preserved and available to explore.
There were two hikes in particular that I enjoyed in Capitol Reef. The first was the hike to Cassidy Arch, named for Butch Cassidy, who supposedly hid out in a gorge nearby. When I got to the top of the arch, I met some people who were planning on rappelling off the arch! I was definitely jealous.
The second hike was the Capitol Gorge hike, which follows what used to be the old pioneer route through the Gorge. There are ancient petroglyphs carved by the Fremont people still in the walls, and much more recent carvings from the turn of the century by pioneers that made their way through the gorge as they settled the west.
All that hiking meant that I felt like I earned the peach pie a la mode that I picked up in Fruita at the end of my trip.
I was lucky enough to find some BLM land right outside the park and camped up on a cliff with a fantastic view of the sunset both nights I stayed at Capitol Reef.
Local Attractions
On my way to Capitol Reef from Great Basin, I took a couple detours to check out some local attractions.
I detoured through Parowan Gap to checkout some ancient petroglyphs made by the Fremont peoples and some fossilized dinosaur tracks. The petroglyphs are supposedly ~1000 years old, and the dinosaur tracks are slightly older. Definitely cool to see these up close - this is the sort of stuff I would expect to see in a Natural History museum!
I also stopped at Cove Fort, and old fort built by Mormon Pioneers. Its operated by the the Mormon Church now as a museum, which means that everyone was very friendly, the tour was free, and I left with a ton of Mormon paraphernalia.
Great Basin National Park
5/29-5/31
I left SLC Memorial Day morning for Great Basin NP. Once I got there, I got a campsite and set about exploring the park. I headed up to the top of the Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive, where I was hoping to hike out to an ancient Bristlecone Pine forest. However, there was still a ton of snow on the ground and I quickly lost the trail. After an hour of wandering, I backtracked to the trailhead and headed back down to the campsite.
I was most excited about exploring Lehman Caves, a cave system that was discovered in the 1800s and had been previously used as a burial site by the Native Americans living in the area. I booked a tour for my second day in the park and was not disappointed at all. The cave was filled with fantastical formations - stalactites, stalagmites, shields, cave popcorn, cave bacon, draperies, etc. The ranger turned off the lights at one point and we experienced absolute darkness - it was fascinating.
The first operator of the caves, Abraham Lehman, used to charge a dollar to allow people to explore the caves back during the turn of the century. This was before the access tunnel that we used had been dug, and so visitors had to rappel 30 feet down to access the cave system. He’d given them a candle and promise that if they didn’t come back in 24 hrs he’d go in after them to find them. Given that the candles only lasted about 4 hours I can imagine that quite a few people had to navigate back in the dark.
If there were a candle-lit tour available I would have signed up for that in a heartbeat.
Aside from the caves, what struck me most about Great Basin was it’s sheer remoteness - it was hours away from any city of note and really gave a feel for the vastness of the American West.
Salt Lake City
5/22-5/29
After spending a couple days taking care of repairs, I decided to do a bit of exploring in the SLC area. In addition to SLC being an awesome town, I knew that Memorial Day would be way too busy at a National Park, so I figured it would be better to do local things and get to know the city. I spent two days camped out on Stansbury Island, which isn’t so much an island as a peninsula jutting into the Salt Lake. While the sunsets were beautiful there, the days were exceptionally hot and there were a ton of mosquitos and other bitey bugs around. I spent most of that time reading inside the van.
The next couple of days I spent hanging out in coffee shops and the public library, doing more reading and catching up on some work. This made for a nice change of pace from the great outdoors. Highlights of these two days were:
- AC - what an amazing invention!
- Not having to put on sunscreen
- Library - need I say more?
I also checked out Red Iguana Mexican Restaurant and sampled a panoply of moles.
I wrapped up my time in SLC with a sunset hike up Bell Canyon to the waterfall. The views of the city and the sunset were breathtaking from the waterfall and the reservoir about halfway up. It’s pretty amazing that this hike and the rest of the Wasatch Front are so accessible to SLC.
Arches & Canyonlands National Parks
5/19-5/23
I picked up Varun late Friday night in Las Vegas and we immediately took off for Utah. Given that we needed to get to Arches the next day and it was over 6 hours away, we wanted to cover as much ground as possible during the night. We pulled into a rest stop an hour into Utah around 2 AM and slept in the parking lot. Given that we were in the van, it was actually really comfortable to sleep there. The following day we stopped for breakfast at Taco Bell (as is tradition), filled up gas, and then continued on our way to Arches. Due to a few stops at vista points along the way, we got there around 3.
Arches is currently undergoing road work, and so they’ve been closing the park from 7 PM - 7 AM every night Sunday - Thursday. This meant that Saturday night was our only night to get night shots there, and we committed to staying up the whole night to photograph the park and just generally hang out. After scoping out a few photography locations (Balanced Rock, Double Arch, the Windows, and Courthouse Towers), we headed to a picnic area to cook a dinner of pasta and veggie sauce. Given that we were going to stay up all night, I brewed some strong tea as well.
We rushed back to Double Arch a little bit late for the shot we had planned, but with enough time to experiment and enjoy the vibrant oranges and reds the setting sun painted on the rock.
For the next few hours, as we waited for the sky to go black and for the Milky Way to rise, we hung out under the one of the massive Windows Arches. It was surreal to be casually experimenting with our cameras under this iconic prehistoric landmark. We found that there was a photography group painting the underside of Double Arch as well, and so we took advantage of their fancy lights to take some shots there as well.
We had committed ourselves to making the hike out to Delicate Arch at around midnight, but having not done the hike before, we repeatedly lost the trail in the dim light of our headlamps. After finally making it to the broad expanse of slickrock where we expected to see the Arch, we instead saw jack shit and made the decision to turn back. Taking it slower this time, we followed footprints and worn rock back down to the parking lot, stopping only a couple times to backtrack a few steps.
Disheartened and disappointed from our failure to find Delicate Arch, we headed back to Double Arch to get Varun’s prized photo of the night - the Milky Way through the Arch. My 50mm lens was too tele to capture that shot, so I settled instead on hopping around between angles underneath the arches and experimenting with different shot compositions and camera settings. Towards the end of the night it struck me again how lucky I was to be able to casually hang out under the Arches and the Milky Way, taking pictures and shooting the shit all night, with the entire area to us.
I managed to get a few hours of sleep in the wee hours of the morning, after which we headed out to see a couple of the Arches further into the park. Unfortunately Devil’s Garden was closed, but we still managed to check out Sand Dune Arch and Broken Arch, which were cool but no where near as impressive as Double Arch.
Exhausted, we headed out of the park and towards Moab, and found a campground along the Colorado river between steep red canyons. After relaxing for a while, we made veggie dogs for dinner and were blessed by a spectacular sunset. I was completely dead, and passed out very soon after.
Monday morning we headed out to check out Canyonlands National Park. We scoped out a couple photography locations, then headed into Moab to buy some dinner & photography supplies. We grilled veggie kababs for dinner, then rushed back to the park to capture sunset and more night shots. We selected two locations: Green River Overlook and Mesa Arch. Mesa Arch turned out to not be ideal for the shot we envisioned, and after a cloud rolled in we packed up and then headed back out to Green River Overlook. We captured our shots and passed out in the parking lot late, although not as late as in Arches.
Tuesday morning we headed out to the view point at the very tip of the Mesa. It was a beautiful view, and after an hour of walking along the rim we headed back to the campsite to clean up and head to Salt Lake City. Varun flew out in the evening and I spoiled myself with a hotel room, as I had a lot of little errands and repairs I wanted to do.
These four days seemed to fly by in a blur! It was awesome to step up my photography game by taking pictures with someone so much more experienced than me, and it really helped having someone around to motivate me to stay up late and hike around in the dark hunting for cool shots. Definitely a trip I won’t forget.
Joshua Tree National Park
5/18-5/19
After some R&R hanging out with Gopi et al in Pomona, I headed to Joshua Tree for a quick 24 hr trip. I camped on some BLM land just south of the entrance, and was lucky enough to find some firewood waiting by a campfire ring. I built a fire, cooked dinner, and waited for the stars to come out. In preparation for the night photography I was planning on doing with Varun, I took out my tripod and started screwing around with long exposure shots. While I didn’t stay up late enough to see the Milky Way come out, I did see an extraordinary number of stars out and learned a little about long exposure photography.
The following morning I headed into Joshua Tree and went on a short walk through the desert along the Cottonwood Springs loop. I was most looking forward to checking out the disused Mammoth Mine, but it was sealed off from entry and pretty disappointing. After finishing the loop, I headed up through the park towards Las Vegas and encountered some cool cacti and the famed yucca for which the park is named.
I rounded off my park visit by exiting the north entrance to the park at 29 Palms and picking up Subway, where the girl who made my sub confided to me that she had no idea why people ate their sandwiches. After eating my questionable sandwich, I headed to Las Vegas to pick up Varun for our trip into Utah.
