Arches and Canyonlands

For one last ho-rah before Adeline gets here, Sarah and I decided to take a mini-vacation over the Easter weekend to Utah.  Right out of the gate we had some issues though because as we got closer to Copper Mountain, we found out that I-70 was closed near Vail for a 30-car pileup.  The only way around this accident was to take a 1 hour detour through a winding mountain road to Leadville and then back up to Minturn.  Ugg.  That sucked. [Read: It was horrendous.] The entire detour the snow was coming down like crazy, it's only a 2-lane road, and it was filled with idiots. [It was the idiot drivers who can't drive in the snow that made it a nightmare. I was trying all kinds of crazy maneuvers to get around retard drivers, and Brian was not very happy with me.]  Eventually we make it back up to I-70 and continued on our way to Moab, UT.

On the way to Moab, I was thinking that this was the first time I've ever been to Utah for a vacation, and then it hit me.  I actually know someone who lives in Utah now, and I think he's my brother! [Hey, we may be engineers, but we never claimed smart] I gave Kevin a call at work and told him we were on our way to Utah and he had to take the rest of the week off and join us. [Read: come camping and hiking with us again - we'll try not to make you vomit this time!] Luckily, his supervisor was cool with it and Kevin decided to join us on Friday night.

Our first day of hiking was in Arches National Park.  Arches is an extremely awesome park and is very family friendly.  Most of the hikes in the park are less than a 1/2 mile long, with only a few of them being multiple miles long. [Um, except somehow we managed to hike 17 MILES in the park that day.] The arches themselves are very cool, and each of them you can walk right up to, stand under, climb on... [so awesome!!] 

The highlight of the day was the very last hike that we did in the park.  The loop is called the Devil's Garden Trail, and it takes you to seven different arches over the course of 5.5 miles.  The first half of the hike is on a well established trail with tons of other folks.  After you get to the end of the trial at Double-O Arch, there is another trail called "The Primitive Trail" that you can take to get back.  The Primitive Trail is not marked with anything other than some cairns, and weaves it's way through the Devils Garden.  The Devils Garden is an area of these very tall sandstone fins that jut out of the desert like a bunch of dinner plates set up to dry.  The trail weaved its way between and over them and provided some of the coolest views in the park. [Ahem, there may or may not have also been some mumblings about being tired and something about "a slave driver," but the only thing I heard for sure was how awesome the trail was when we were done!]

Friday night, Bones finally rolled into town and met us at our campsite.  The next day the three of us headed out to Canyonlands National Park, specifically the Needles section of the park.  Our destination for the day was Druid Arch.  Sarah did a bunch of reading before hand and a ton of folks said it was the most impressive thing in the park, so of course we had to go see it. [I read one random person's blog about how he enjoyed the hike, and decided that sounded good enough to me.]  The hike to Druid Arch is now on my list of all-time great hikes.  You start out hiking on a solid sandstone trail at the top of a valley.  Eventually you make your way down to the valley floor and wind your way through this large drainage.  

As you get closer to Druid Arch you slowly climb back on top of the valley, and after performing a bit of dodgy scrambling at the end, you come over the lip of the valley and see Druid Arch standing there.

Of all the arches we saw at both national parks, this one is by far the coolest, most awe inspiring, and of course, hardest to get to. [It was cool as hell. You can't even fathom the size from this picture, but it must have been 20 times larger and taller than anything we saw at Arches.]  Due to the mileage and scrambling, not many people attempt to make it back to the Druid, which makes it that much nicer since you can sit and enjoy it by yourself.

Eventually we make our way back to the car, sore, tired, and ready for some food and sleep. [I had a brilliant detour idea that would add either 5 miles or 2 miles to the hike. Brian and Kevin made it clear before the hike that they outnumbered me with veto power on any of my "great ideas" - but I quickly corrected them that I, with child, most definitely tied them. Either way, the 2 mile detour compromise had me totally dragging major ass the last hour - it was quite a long day!]  
On Sunday we again got up early and headed to Canyonlands, but this time we went to the north side of the park, which they call "Island in the sky."  Much like Arches, this part of the park is mostly overlooks and trails that are less than a mile long. [Thank goodness, I was so beat.]

The views from the overlooks were totally impressive and you could see for miles.  Canyonlands kind of reminds me of those nesting russian dolls, where inside every doll is another doll. [What?] As you look out from the overlook, you see a canyon.  Inside that canyon is another canyon, and that canyon has another canyon inside it.

All in all it was a great vacation.  We did two of the coolest hikes I've done in a long time, got to hang out with Kevin, and get one last outdoorsy adventure before the fatherhood adventure begins. [AGREED! WAHOO!]

P.S. We almost ran out of gas on the way home! I noticed I had maybe a quarter to a third of a tank left when I saw a sign for Grand Junction, 89 miles. I made up my mind right there I was going make it - because who doesn't like a bit of game on a 6 hour drive home, right? Anyway, Brian woke up and reminded me we needed gas...the car started stalling 1 mile from the exit and Brian was so pissed, he told me if we ran out he was going to make me walk to the gas station, AHAHAHA. I coasted in with flying colors!