Moab, UT

We had about a 4 1/2 hour drive from Park City to Moab. Snow was predicted for today in Park City and they were right. We even hit some flurries driving south. A nice drive even though we had one 10% grade to go down.

Of course, we had planned on visits to Canyonland NP and Arches NP but with the big SHUTDOWN, don't know if that will happen. Maybe we will be able to just drive through. We'll see. I will catch up on laundry, again, this afternoon and we will be ready to roll in the morning.

Day 1 - Fri, Oct 4, 2013
Rode down to entrance to Arches NP just to see if we can maybe move the cones blocking the road. Well, we could move the cones but we couldn't get by the Park Ranger sitting there so on to something else.

Entrance to Arches National Park

We took the road north along the southern edge of the National Park following the Colorado River. I am sure we are missing some awesome stuff in the park but this drive was pretty darn good.
Colorado River

Returned to Moab and followed the river south this time on what is referred to as the Potash road. Again, very beautiful rock formations. I looked up how the formations are made and, of course, it is very complicated, but, kind of interesting....so, I won't bore you with it because you can google it, too.
Also, along this road, we saw some petroglyphs and dinosaur tracks. Yes, I did say dinosaurs. There are ways of dating this stuff down to a couple of million years and since the tracks were somewhere between 100 and 155 million years, I'll take their word for it.
Petroglyphs from the Formative Period (1500BC - 300AD)
More petroglyphs in same area Circled items are theropod dinosaur tracks dating back 190 million years.

Some interesting sites along the way:
Jug Handle Arch thought this was interesting , boulder perched on small mound

Rock climber Close up of rock climber

Day 2 - Sat, Oct 5, 2013
A day of football and baseball. FSU played Maryland, both undefeated at gametime! Only one could remain undefeated...who would it be? FSU....whoopee! The Noles swamped (no pun intended for my Gator friends) Maryland 63 - 0! Yahoo! Our exuberance would be short lived though, as we tuned into the Rays/Redsox playoff game. It just wasn't to be for the Rays in Boston; a loss, 3 - 7. Now they move to St Pete, so MAYBE.

Burgers on the grill for dinner. Geared up for a good hike tomorrow.

Day 3 - Sun, Oct. 6, 2013
Today we head to Dead Horse Point State Park since we cannot get into Canyonlands and this is right on the border. You are actually looking into Canyonlands from some point. Oh well, as close as we can get; thank you again US Govt.. Dead Horse Point, as the legend goes, is an area in the canyon where cowboys would drive wild mustangs. It was a plateau surrounded by the Green River below. The mustangs would be corralled in, the entrance blocked off and then the "good" horses culled out and the others let go. Supposedly, for whatever reason, the rejects at one point were never let go and all died, thus, Dead Horse Point.

We walked the East Rim of the canyon, then, headed back to truck.

From Dead Horse, we headed to Needles Overlook. It was quite a drive as went from the north side of Canyonlands to the south side, not through (thank you US Govt) but around. Passed by Wilson's Arch and Hole 'N the Rock. The Hole looked a little touristy so we didn't stop but supposedly someone built a house in the rock (Kind of like the House ON the Rock in WI but not as grand)
Wilson's Arch Hole 'N the Rock (jeep in circle on rock)

It was a little hazy at Needles Overlook so we really couldn't see the Needles in Canyonlands but we did see some awe inspiring rock formations and canyons.

Day 4 - Mon, Oct. 7, 2013
Headed out today to Sterling, UT for a couple of days stopover.