Author: searcyf@mac.com

12 May 2018

It was breakfast at the Oasis again and then off to Zapata Falls.  From the lodge, it is approximately 5 miles to the turn off to the falls and then another 2.5 miles to the falls parking lot.  It starts out on Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land and as you head towards the falls, it becomes state land.

The BLM states the road is very rough and some cars may not be suited to make the trip and I can see why.  It wasn’t as rough as the Medano road I took on the first day but there were plenty of dips, rocks, and washboards.  It’s a very slow drive to the falls parking lot and I suspect it took me at least 30 minutes to make the trip.

Once at the parking lot, you hike up a 0.25 mile rocky trail to the beginning of the falls.  To get to see the falls, you have to wade the flow from the falls, often rock hopping to keep from getting soaked.  It’s not as bad as it sounds – it was shallow enough in some places you could simply walk in your boots and not get wet.  However, there were some deep places that you had to precariously balance on rocks. 

You enter a chasm in the rocks and the lower part of the falls are visible there.  I was surprised to see ice from the past winter still clinging to the side of the gorge.  

As you go further into the gorge, you can see the 25 foot falls.  It is rather spectacular (seems to be a standard description this trip) particularly when you have to enter the gorge to see the falls. 

Going back down to the parking lot was easier but also more treacherous.  The rocks would slip out from under your feet.  Luckily, the Advils and anti-inflammatory cream I used last night helped out the ankle and I was able to make the hike OK.  Overall, the walk was 0.7 miles.  Elevation is 9, 260 feet so you definitely feel the altitude.
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One of the stranger sights I’ve seen this trip was a young man and woman walking up the trail and the man was carrying an ironing board.  I stated I understand everything they’re doing except the ironing board.  Apparently, it’s one of those things that you take a teddy bear, a photo, an elf, etc. and carry it to far off places and take a photo with it.  His meme is “Extreme Ironing” with the hash tag of  #livewrinklefree.  Whatever works!

After the falls, I decided to return to the Great Sand Dunes National Park and do some short day hikes around the Dune Parking lot and the visitor center. 

What a difference a day makes!  The cars were backed up for quite a ways to get into the park.  So much so that there were two rangers checking people into the park.  I attribute it to it being Saturday, and when I think about it, the campgrounds and RV park were full as I passed them this morning on the way to the falls.

Once I pulled into the Dunes parking lot, I realized it was totally full.  People were waiting for people to leave in order to park.  

One of the big things in the park is sand boarding.  I guess it is a lot like snow boarding but you  can’t use a snow board on sand.  You rent your sand board at the Oasis for the day and people drag the board to the top of the dunes and then sand board their way down.  

There’s usually a line of people waiting to rent their boards at the Oasis.  I have yet to see anyone sand board down but I have seen plenty of people drag them up the dunes.  

Since the parking lot was full, I decided to head to the visitor center and walk the 0.5 nature trail – called the Sand Ridge trail.  It was actually a nice little walk with well placed signage and information.  It was also mostly level.

I returned to the Oasis for lunch and then decided it was time again to wash clothes.  It seems I do a lot of clothes washing on this trip, but it’s usually the same clothes over and over.  Mostly, the dirty stuff is the hiking stuff but occasionally its jeans and dress shirts for in town stuff.

Tomorrow I head to Rapid City, South Dakota and the Alex Johnson hotel.  It’s an historic hotel in the downtown area and when Michel, Nancy and I did the summer trip to Yellowstone in 2014, we stayed there.  It’s a quirky, neat old hotel.  From there I head to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota.  This will be three nights of camping and I just read the weather report for Rapid City and I may get a little cold in North Dakota.  

11 May 2018

One of the benefits of staying at the lodge is watching the light change on the dunes.  They are never the same, no matter how many times you glance at them.  During the day, clouds pass over them and late in the afternoon shadows gather.

Sunset was pretty nice also.  Although the sun doesn’t rise and shine directly on the dunes nor set behind the dunes, with the cloud cover from yesterday, we got a great sunset.

I got up at 5:30 am and was out the door by 7:00.  I decided I wanted to get an early start on the Dunes.  As soon as I got in the jeep, it started beeping that my tire pressure was too low.  It got down to 43 F last night and that sometimes causes tire pressure to read low, but I suspect it was inaccuracy of my putting air into the tires yesterday when they were under inflated.  

I pulled into the air pump at the park and added air to all four of the tires.  Strangely, the air pressure has varied all day.  I now suspect that when I went through the Medano Creek fords (6 up and 6 back) the sensor in the tires got wet and is giving false readings.  

In any case, I started my journey to the dunes at 7:30 am.  My goal was to reach the High Dune on the first ridge, elevation 8,691 feet (you start at 7,992).  It’s a 2.5 mile round trip.  However, you have to cross the Medano Creek bed which is the first 0.5 miles.  From there on, it’s up, up, up to a total elevation gain of 699 feet.  I must have been close to the top because I made it to an elevation of 560 feet. 

The park ranger suggested walking the ridges of the dunes.  That works somewhat but what I found to work better was to make my own switchbacks in the dunes, particularly when faced with a massive dune in front of you.  There are no trails – you make your own.

You don’t realize how massive these things are until you actually reach the dune field.  Everything is dwarfed in comparison.

On my way up, someone was far ahead of me and he actually made it to the top of the dune.  I noticed he had to stop and rest as much as I but when he did make the top, he did the Rocky pump and victory dance.  I don’t blame him.

Also on my way up, a couple passed me coming down.  She was barefoot and he wore boots.  Then I noticed she was cradling something – I assume a baby but it was so wrapped up to protect against the wind and sand I can’t be sure.  It could have been a dog.  I saw several on the dunes.  I did not see any couple at the top, so I suspect they did not go all the way up unless they were there for sunrise.  

I did not make it to the top.  I got close – probably within a fifth of a mile, but walking through very fine, loose sand is exhausting.  I reached my end point when I realized I was getting light headed. 
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I’m sure it was part elevation and part exhaustion.  

As I started down (much easier) I noticed I could not retrace my footsteps since they had been obliterated.  We are in a Red Flag warning for much of the states of Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona.  That means wind, low humidity, arid conditions – ripe for wildfires.  The wind was certainly blowing.  It’s blowing a steady 22 mph and the effect is you are sand blasted while on the dunes.  The wind covered your footprints in the sand almost immediately.

Once I got back to the jeep, I headed to the Oasis with their restaurant for a hearty breakfast.  

I then decided to a little more hiking.  The first was the Montville Nature Trail, a 0.5 mile loop with an elevation gain of 200 feet.  

It’s a pretty trail with a modest climb that merges with the Mosca Pass Trail and the Wellington Ditch Trail.  The Mosca Pass Trail is a 7 mile round trip with an elevation gain of 1400 feet and I was not up for that.  Instead, I decided to do the Wellington Ditch trail that ended in the Piñon Flats campground 1 mile further on.  I could then walk the road back to the jeep where I parked at the beginning of the Montville Nature Trail.

Because I had hike the dunes earlier for 2.34 miles (gps) and now walked the 2.39 miles (gps) Montville/Wellington Ditch Trails, I managed to do 4.7 miles.  My ankle started bothering me on the Wellington Ditch Trail.  Then my right ankle started.  I did make it back to the jeep but came straight back to the lodge and showered and immediately got into bed a little after noon. 

I didn’t think I slept but when I got out of bed, it was 2:30 pm so I must have dozed off.

I suspect tomorrow will be a recovery day.  I intend to drive to Zapata Falls, some 10 miles away and walk the 0.5 miles to the falls but that’s probably it.

So far, it seems every third day is ankle recovery day.  

10 May 2018

It was an interesting night at Elktrace B&B.  I’ve been spelling it wrong in previous posts.  It’s all one word.  In any case, a new couple came in around 10:30 pm along with my hostess Evelyn.  Evelyn has another dog and all three set off a row when the new guests arrived.  I was used to dogs but it took a while for the humans to calm down.

I got up around 5:30 am and around 6:30 decided to take a shower.  I could not for the life of me figure out how to turn the shower on.  Not only that, but the shower door opened inward and that meant you either needed to reach around the door or stand in the shower to turn it on. 

Frustrated, I got dressed and found Evelyn in the kitchen.  I introduced myself and after a little small talk, asked her how to turn the shower on.  You pull the shower handle first and then turn.  I finally got a shower.

Evelyn fixed a delicious Western omelette and added hash browns (frozen) and a fresh croissant.  She also had orange juice, coffee, and fresh fruit.  

She wrote down my credit card information and said she would enter all the charges of all guests later in the day.  I packed and departed around 8:00 am headed for Great Sand Dunes, a two and one half hour drive.

About midway to the dunes, I get a call.  She felt she had miscopied the credit card information.  I pulled over to the side of the road, read the card number to her and she said something must be wrong, that there are usually four sets of four numbers.  I agreed and said that was what I just read her.  

She profusely apologized and said she made a mistake, she had copied it correctly, and that she was having a bad day.  I kind of noticed she was a little discombobulated when she was making breakfast.  She would start one thing, forget it, then come back to it.  I hope it is not an early sign of dementia.

The B&B was certainly luxurious but it was not originally designed as a B&B.  She has a large, grown family with her husband Tom and the place was designed to accommodate her the extended family.  This means there was little to no sound proofing between rooms so you could hear everything that anyone was doing.  It’s a beautiful place but I don’t think it works as a B&B.

I made the rest of the drive to Great Sand Dunes without incident.  It was too early to check into the lodge so I stopped at the visitor center for a map and information.  I decided to take the Medano Pass Primitive Road, an 11 mile one way wilderness road that requires high vehicle clearance and 4 wheel ability.  Let’s just say I like a challenge.

At mile 1.1 you pass the Point of No Return which means 4 wheel ability, high clearance and a very strongly worded warning about reducing tire pressure to 20 psi.  I think it said that if you don’t do it you will get stuck.

I’ve driven in sand two times before.  The first time was at Padre Island National Seashore.  You can drive on the beach at Padre Island up to a point and then a sign warns you don’t go any further without 4 wheel drive.  I was in the Coast Guard stationed at Corpus Christi, Texas and decided to go to Padre Island.  Of course, I ignored the sign, got bogged in the sand and realized the tide was coming in.  

It was desperation time.  A kindly 4 wheeler stopped, pulled me out, and made sure I made it back to the “safe” area for non-4 wheelers.  Additionally, he did not tell me how stupid I was.

My second time in the sand was at Padre Island National Seashore.  Wait, I just wrote that! It was still  Padre Island National Seashore.  My cousin Jo, her husband Bill and I went for a drive to the seashore.  Bill ignored the sign.  I suggested it was not a good idea to drive on the sand.  He said it was perfectly OK.  I tried one more time and gave up.  We got stuck. The tide started coming in.  My memory lets me down on how we got out of that jam but we did.
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Today was my third time in the sand.  I obeyed the sign.  I put the jeep in “Sand” function, deflated the tires, and drove through like a champ.  When I got to the part of the road that heads to the pass where it became rocky, I re-inflated the tires, put the jeep in 4 wheel “Rocks” and made it to round 8.6 miles of 11.2 for the road.  After a point, I decided enough beating the tires to death on the rocks and turned around.  

You may wonder how I re-inflated the tires.  I do have a bicycle tire pump (from the stolen bike bit) but I also decided to purchase an air pump that hooks into the lighter of the jeep.  It did all the work for me.  It was slow but effective and the added height of the tires with the air and the 4-wheel “Rocks” setting was sufficient to get me over some pretty large rocks and drop offs.

On the return trip, I had to deflate again for the sand portion. Once back on the main road, the park service maintains an air pump so you can pump up your tires again.  Amazingly, it was operational.

The jeep performed magnificently.  This is exactly the reason I purchased a 4 wheel drive and this was my first real experience with having to use it off road. Yes, I know I was on a road, but only in name.  It made me understand the term “rock ribbed road”.  It’s the roughest thing I’ve been on.    I can’t say enough about how well the jeep performed.

I pulled into the Oasis – just outside of the park – (the only store/restaurant within 20 miles) and purchased some sandwiches for the next three dinners.  The restaurant is only open from 8 am – 3 pm until the peak of tourist season.

I then checked into the Great Sand Dunes Lodge (privately owned) and unloaded the jeep.  This will be my base of operations for the nest two days.  Depending on my ankle, I would like to hike to the top of one of the dunes.

The park is certainly busy.  As you turn down the “dune” drive, the parking lot was full.  At first, it looked like ants were crawling all over the dunes.  It turns out it was people.  

The things are massive.  They are the tallest dunes in the United States.  

The view outside my balcony at the lodge is spectacular.  It reminds me of the scifi Dune.  

Now for a good night sleep (I hope) and a fresh start tomorrow.

9 May 2018

Driving from Montrose to Ouray is boring.  Driving from Ouray to Durango is nail biting.  You go through two mountain passes to an elevation of over 11,000 feet with guard rails at least twice on the trip.  Otherwise, it’s a sheer drop to the canyon floor below.  In most places, the speed limit was 25 mph and at times I thought that a little reckless.  Suffice to say others thought the same since no one was pushing to pass me on the road.  The San Juan Mountains are impressive!

Horrors!  Pagosa Springs has gone chic!  The nice, quiet, quaint little town with a main drag has gone tourist.  Even the nice, quiet, quaint part of town is now upscale.  There’s an entirely new downtown section, and outside of town all the box stores like Walmart, Home Depot, etc.  None of this was here 2 years ago when I passed through on my way to Mesa Verde.

I,at one time, thought I might like to live in Pagosa Springs.  It was not too large, not too small.  It had an interesting downtown and plenty of hiking trails throughout the San Juan Mountains.  I even bought the National Geographic topographic map of the region

Strangest of all in Pagosa Springs is a Cajun restaurant on the old main street appropriately named The Lost Cajun.  The owner of the franchise is originally from Barataria, Louisiana and moved to Colorado to open a single restaurant.  It became so successful he opened several more throughout the state.

The first thing the waitress does is ask if you would like a sampler of gumbo.  Of course!  There were five and I chose a cup of seafood.  It actually was excellent.  The chef makes them from scratch every day.  

For dessert, I had 3 beignets.  They say on the menu they are like the ones in New Orleans only better.  I disagree.  You cannot beat Cafe Du Monde for beignets.  However, I managed to choke down three of them.  I now have a sugar fix for the next three days.

I have stumbled upon the most plush B&B.  It’s called Elk Trace B&B and it is 2 miles outside of downtown Pagosa Springs.  When I was researching a place to stay last year, this one kept popping up on the web.  The photos looked good and I thought for one night, why not splurge.

This place is quite luxurious.  The bedroom is huge with a couch and king size bed.  

The bathroom is almost as big with double sinks and a massive walk-in shower.  
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The great room is two story with a vaulted ceiling.  

There is a wrap around porch and one couple and I have it all to ourselves.  

There’s even a dog for each of us.  One of uncertain lineage and the other a boxer that reminds me of Nicole’s Lexi, except a male.

It’ll be a long trip into town for dinner tonight but we the quiet of the countryside, I will not mind that.  

My one disappointment is I will not get to visit Chimney Rock National Monument.  They do not open until May 15th.  I thought I had checked about the availability last year but either I did not or they changed the opening date for the monument (more likely since the NPS has done that several times on this trip).  It’s actually run by the local Ute tribe and I was looking forward to the tour.  

It is the most imposing feature either leaving Pagosa Springs for Durango or entering from Durango.  

Of course, I looked at real estate prices out here and they are far in excess of Ouray, so Ouray, at the moment, is a bargain in comparison.  

Tomorrow should be a short drive to Great Sand Dunes National Park for 3 nights.

8 May 2018

Hooray for Ouray!

Sorry, I couldn’t resist.

Today was a short day for travel and a much needed day of rest.

I decided to go see Ouray.  Jim and Holley (especially Jim) has been raving about Ouray.  If I didn’t know better, I would say this is where these two are going to move next.

It’s a town of around 1000 people and has an old fashioned Main Street.  With the era of suburbia and strip malls, that’s a quaint relic of days gone by and one that I miss.

I remember walking down the Main Street of Morton, Mississippi and being able to pretty much find anything I needed: pharmacy, five & dime, clothing stores, restaurants, movie theater, even the hospital was on Main Street.

Ouray is a lot like that.  One thing I really enjoyed seeing is Ouray protected its old buildings.  A hotel may not be a hotel any longer but the original from 1890’s is still standing on Main Street.  As often as not, the original purpose of the building is still in effect.

Like most small towns, the Main Street is not long.  I walked the length of it and back (bad ankle notwithstanding) and didn’t spend more than 1/2 hour window shopping.  I got there a little after 9 am and absolutely nothing was open.  Most of the stores open at 11 am and that’s in tourist season which it is decidedly not.
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I did look at some real estate offerings and most of the prices were in the $250K-450K price range.  There were some bargains but they would require a lot of work.  It seems not only the Wilson’s like Ouray.

I was tempted to get in their hot springs (at the entrance to town) but even that looked like it would not open until 11 or later.

I head out tomorrow for Pagosa Springs.  I could actually have driven to Great Sand Dunes National Park in one day and Pagosa Springs takes me further south, but I went through the town two years ago on my last cross country trip and fell in love with the place.  For Jim and Holley, it’s Ouray.  For me, it’s Pagosa Springs.  I’ll be staying one night at Elk Trace Bed & Breakfast just outside of Pagosa Springs but I intend to do some window shopping while in town.  I also want to tour Chimney Rock (every place out here has a chimney rock) which is run by a local tribe.  They allow only two tours a day to the sacred place.

Pagosa Springs reminds me of a hip college town that’s located in the mountains.  I’ll be sure to take some photos of the place so you can fall in love with it also.

After returning to Montrose, I toured the Montrose Botanical Gardens – a work in progress.  They have a very neat area behind the Civic Center that has a great deal of room for expansion.  I was most interested in seeing their native plants and they had an entire section of the garden dedicated to them.

I then called the local jeep dealer, Flowers, and asked if they could dispose of about a pint of diesel fuel.  After the work on the jeep brought on by my stupidity, the water in fuel light came on and I drained it.  I need to get rid of the water and diesel fuel in the container into which I drained it.

The local jeep dealer said sure, bring it over.  I did, they disposed of it, did not charge me, and were super nice.  I particularly enjoyed a sign in the parts department that advertised “free blinker fluid” and commented on it.

From there, it was wash-the-jeep time.  There are two hand held spray car washes next to each other in Montrose.  I pulled into the first one and for the third time this trip debugged the jeep.  Love bugs are terrible in Florida but these are not love bugs.  I think I have found several new insect species on the grill of the jeep.  I intend to name one Glueus maximus.  Even the power spray is not enough to remove them and I have to use a scrubbing pad.

I suspect I’ll have to debug several more times on the trip. Now for a nap.

7 May 2019

I think I overdid it with my ankle today.  The distance wasn’t so bad but the up and down was pretty constant.  More Advil tonight.  I must be getting old.  I can’t hike the distances I used to be able to.  I did a total of 5.3 miles today and was tired!

I started out early and was on the Oak Flat Trail by 9:30 am.  A couple started the trail before I got on it and I never did catch them.  I did get a photograph of them resting much further down the trail and very close to the last jumping off point to the bottom of the gorge.  

I don’t think I’ve walked a steeper trail going downhill than the beginning of the Oak Flat Trail.  I’m not sure of the grade but I suspect it was over 25% in some places.

Usually, when the descent is that steep (the trail drops 400 feet from the rim) that means it’ll be a bear to get back up.  However, the trail up was more gradual than the descent and did not cause me any problem.

Every so often you would make a switchback and the vista of the canyon opened up before you.  

After getting back to the top, there was a trail branch for the Upland Trail.  I was hoping for more, different wildflowers but the trail disappointed.  Actually, I think this would have been better named Oak Flat Trail.  It was pretty flat and had a lot of oaks and not much scenery.  You cross the park road twice as you swing back towards the visitor center.

At one point of the Upland Trail, you get a great view of Tomichi Point.  You actually walk the south rim of the canyon and climb to Tomichi Point.  From there it is a quick walk to the visitor center where I had parked the jeep.

The Oak Flat Trail is 2 miles and the Upland Trail is 2 miles, so you do the math.

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Warner Point was his favorite place in the park.  Round trip it is 1 1/3 miles.  This was the part that did my ankle in.  It was down, then up, then down then up, then down and finally up to the point. 

The view was probably the best overall view of the canyon and it is the deepest part of the canyon at 2700 feet.

I had company on the last part of the hike.  He seemed as curious about me as I was about him.

The final part of the day was a drive to East Portal.  This is a drive to the bottom of the canyon where the dam is located.  Montrose needed water and the Black Canyon of the Gunnison had it.  The problem was how to get it to Montrose.  In the early 1900’s Abraham Lincoln Fellows and William Torrence were the first people to traverse the river down the canyon in rubber rafts.  They were surveying the canyon for a tunnel to Montrose.  

They found a suitable site for the tunnel and construction of the 5.8 mile Gunnison Diversion Tunnel began in 1905 and dedicated in 1909.  It is still in use today.

The road down, of course, had hairpin turns but more importantly, the grade was 16%.  That’s the steepest grade I think I have ever driven over any length of road. It was pretty much 20 mph in first gear all the way down.

At the end of the road is the dam and tunnel.

Tomorrow I plan to drive over to Ouray, Colorado.  Someone, I can’t remember who, Jim Wilson, insists I see this town of around 1000 people.  It should be an interesting drive.  The town is found a valley surrounded by mountains.  Wilson waxes poetic about this place so I better not be disappointed or he’ll never hear the end of it.

6 May 2018

It was a fast drive from Capitol Reef to Black Canyon of the Gunnison outside of Montrose, Colorado – about 5 hours.  I stopped in Grand Junction at the REI store.  

Somewhere along the trip, I lost a set of tent pegs for the REI 8 person tent.  They were substantial metal pegs and I needed to replace them.  I actually put the tent up at Craters of the Moon with spare pegs I use for the smaller tents but I could tell they would not be good for the bigger tent in any wind.

The REI store opened at 11 am and I pulled into the parking lot at 10:50 am.  The tent pegs were $1 each and I bought 10.  I probably will not put up the big tent but one more time – at Theodore Roosevelt National Park.

I pulled into Black Canyon of the Gunnison around 1:35 pm and immediately hit the visitor center.  The information ranger at the desk suggested some easy day hikes for me tomorrow and I decided to drive the length of the South Rim Road (7 miles) and pull into all the overlooks.   There are 10 along the length of the road.

The first overlook was Pulpit Rock.  There is a projection of rocks out into the canyon and you can walk onto the “pulpit”. 

This is a pretty amazing canyon.  One expert, George Wallace R. Hansen said “no other North American canyon combines the depth, narrowness, sheerness, and somber countenance of Black Canyon.” 

Unfortunately, photography does not do it justice.  You need stereoscopic vision to appreciate the depth and sheerness of the canyon.  As I walked to the edge, I would get a tingling in my feet and a tinge of vertigo.  I do that when I’m around high places, but I quickly become accustomed to the feeling.  Every time I walked to an observation point, the feeling re-occurred.

It was here I decided I had died and gone to heaven.  I photographed more wildflowers in bloom in 1 hour here in the park than I did the last three days in Capitol Reef.

Next observation point is Cross Fissures.  You get a good view of some giant splits in the rock from this point.  It’s an easy 375 yard walk to the fissures.  Each location told you how many yards you had to walk to get to the observation point which was handy for people who were worried about the distance.

From Cross Fissures, it was a short drive to Rock Point.  

From there, another short drive to Devil’s Lookout, although I don’t know what the devil was looking out for.  
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Next up was Chasm View, another short drive.  You get an idea how deep the canyon can be. 

One of the more spectacular views was Painted Wall. A sheer cliff was patterned with pegmatite. This molten rock squeezed into fissures in the canyon wall and solidified to form the bands of minerals of mica, feldspar, quartz and garnet (go FSU).

Next up was Cedar Point.   Yes, there are a lot of Utah Junipers (not true cedars) on the point but you don’t go to look at the cedars.

Dragon Point was pretty spectacular as you can see below.  It had a great view of the Painted Wall.

Sunset Point probably offered the best view of the canyon – its sheer size and depth.  

The turn around was High Point.  First thing tomorrow is the 2 mile Oak Flat Trail which descends 400 feet into the canyon.  I ‘ll also try the 1 1/3 mile to Walker Point from where you will see the canyon at its deepest – 2700 feet.

I also intend to hike the Rock Trip and Take Flat Trail during this trip.  I’ll see how I progress as to whether I get them all done.  

After hiking, I’ll drive the East Portal road which drops you down to the canyon floor.  It has a 16% incline that your vehicle must be able to manage.

Just walking to the observation points today, I clocked 2.3 miles.  Remember, if it is 100 yards to a point, it’s 100 yards back. All said and done, it was 4026 yards of hiking.

Tonight is wash night at the Quality Inn and Suites (just OK) and a late dinner.  

5 May 2018

My ankle felt OK this morning so I opted to forego the drive to Grand Staircase – Escalante.  It would have been 2 1/2 hour drive there and 2 1/2 hours back and I’ll be doing enough driving tomorrow morning.  I would like to see it and also eventually Monument Valley but it’ll have to wait for another trip.

Some of you know my college French teacher (and good friend) Jack Brown lives on the big island of Hawaii.  He lives off the grid near the town of Pahoa.  That’s were the volcano Kilauea erupted yesterday and then the 6.9 quake.  Pahoa is in direct line of the lava flow.  I sent an email and then eventually called.  He emailed me back he was on vacation in the Philippines and was safe and as far as he knew at the moment his home was OK.  

With that established, I had breakfast at the retreat – buffet style – just OK and loaded up for the trip to Capitol Reef for some more hiking.

I retraced my steps to Capitol Gorge today.  I confess my first trip down to the gorge yesterday I got sidetracked with wildflowers.  I was looking down and not up.  Today, I looked up.  I’m not sure there is a more spectacular drive in all the U.S.  I can’t believe I didn’t see this yesterday.

In any case, I decided to hike to the Golden Throne formation.  The hike is labeled as strenuous and is 2 miles – up – one way.  The elevation climb at 730 feet is not terrible but it is a constant climb.  For the most part, the trail is pretty well marked and after an initial struggle up a steep slope, it levels out for a while.  

I think you hike around three or four canyons to get to the Golden Throne.  You round the corner of one canyon, go all the way back to its beginning and then hike around another canyon, and repeat.

One sight startled me.  A lone pine tree on the face of a cliff.

The final ascent is pretty steep but once you get there, you have a great view of the Golden Throne. 

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However, at first glance, it looks nothing like a throne.  Not far away is another feature that to me looked more like a throne.  It looks like it has two arm rests.  It is also a nice golden color.

The actual Golden Throne is more massive and if you look carefully, there is a large horizontal and vertical piece missing from the formation that gives the impression of a “seat”.  

This was a great hike.  My ankle made it OK and I was able to complete the hike in a little over 2 hours.  I had lunch at the end of the trail looking at the Golden Throne.  I’m more comfortable in trying to do a “strenuous” hike.  I’ve done several this trip (2 at Capitol Reef) and have faired well.  I do take a lot of rest breaks, though.

I met several people along the trail and they were all very nice.  There were two guys coming up as I was leaving and they were in some deep philosophical discussion.   It seemed like one was a professor and the other was a student.  Neither stopped talking the entire hike.  They passed me going down the trail after they reached the top and they were still talking.  I doubt very seriously they saw anything of the scenery or the vistas along the trail they were so deep in conversation.  

As I returned towards the Visitor Center, I stopped at the historic Gifford House (museum and store) and purchased one of their famous pies – cherry if you please – for $6.  I think that will be part of my desert tonight.  Everyone was eating them all around the picnic tables near the house.  They must be good.  

I was going to hike a little along Fremont Creek but as I started on the trail, it was very uninteresting, so I opted to drive to the other end of the park to say I had been to both entrances.  

Tomorrow I have a five hour drive to Montrose, Colorado where I will set up operations at the Quality Inn and Suites for three nights and from there explore the Black Canyon of the Gunnison.  

4 May 2018

What a great day!  The weather was perfect, the sky was blue, and my ankle didn’t bother me too much.  I also think I might have a new “favorite” national park!

As I mentioned yesterday, I ultimately decided to hike the Chimney Loop.  Fortunately, the loop was 3.8 miles round trip, not one way.  I started the hike at 9:09 am and finished 2 hours and 23 minutes later.  This is a spectacular hike.  

All Trails recommended that when I come to the junction of Spring Trail and the Loop, to hike the loop counterclockwise.  That’s the steepest ascent and I wanted to tackle that first thing.  The trail is rated as strenuous but I didn’t have too much trouble.

I did run into an Australian couple and the guy kept wanting to give me lessons in geology and show me his gps.  He is a retired electrical engineer.  I think his wife mostly humored him. He really just wanted was to rest before continuing to climb.  Let it be known that they passed me on the trail but later I passed them and finished the trail well ahead of them.  

This loop is rated as one of the best hikes in the park and I cannot help but agree.  The top of the ridge lets you look down on The Chimney, 300 feet above the floor so the trail at the top was at least 350 or 400 feet.  

There are two gymnosperms dominant here: the two needle Piñon Pine (Pinus edulis) and the Utah Juniper (Juniperus osteosperma).  Both leave beautiful driftwood-like shapes on the landscape.  Most of what I saw as dead was Utah Juniper.

At the top of the ridge, I could look down on two places I visited yesterday: Panorama Point and Gooseneck.  

I also got a different view of Fluted Walls.

After I finished, my gps said I traveled 3.85 miles.  The Australian couple said 5.75 miles and 640 feet elevation gain.  I think they were using kilometers instead of feet and miles.

Next on the agenda was to drive the Scenic Drive.  It’s a ten mile road that ends in Capitol Gorge.  The scenery here is amazing.You drive down a canyon with sheer walls to either side of you and constant warnings to not be in that location during flash floods.  

It is not the buy cipla viagra right way to deal with it. Kamagra is usually found in three doses- 25, tadalafil cheap prices 50 and 100 milligrams. A woman levitra 60 mg might even begin to wonder if the risk balances with the reward. That is the reason; they are of the same genre of buying generic cialis. The place was packed and even when it changed to dirt roads, the traffic was pretty heavy.  Some of the views are worth a mention.

One of the formations is known as Egyptian Temple.  What a strange rock formation!

As I drove back the 10 miles to US 24, you got a magnificent panoramic view of Capitol Reef National Park.

As I say, in for a penny, in for a pound,  I headed to Hickman’s Bridge.  This is a 1.9 mile round trip to a natural bridge.  

One part of the trail affords the best view of Capitol Dome.  The white sandstone is known as Navajo Sandstone and it gives the park its name.

It’s all uphill at first and you gain 600 feet in elevation as you hike up.

At mile 0.9, you come to the bridge.  It’s pretty amazing and you can walk under the span.  This is the first time I’ve known the public to be allowed to walk under the span of a natural bridge.  As a matter of fact, the loop requires you to walk under the span.

My last stop of the day was at The Petroglyphs.  How anyone got up on the side of that cliff to do these is beyond me but they were impressive.  I suspect they were about 60 feet off the ground and each petroglyph was probably at least a foot in height.

They were also some of the most well formed ones I’ve seen.  

I ended my day with a shower and an enchilada dinner at a local Mexican Restaurant – Le Cueva.  

I’m up in the air about tomorrow.  I could do some more hiking but I can tell my ankle is sore from the last hike.  I did a total of around 5.85 miles today.  Some of the Hickman Bridge trail was very rough and rocky and it took its toll.

An option is to drive 185 miles south of here to Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.  This is one of those that the Trump administration is cutting back the size – along with Mules Ears.  I’ll let the ankle decide tomorrow.  

3 May 2018

Breakfast at Hidden Canyon was at 8 am.  The cook made my breakfast to order and then sat down and had a long conversation with me about the park, the retreat, people in the park service, and every other topic we could think of.  What a nice person! I was the only person at the retreat last night.  Even so, the cook prepared me a full breakfast – eggs, beef sausage, toast, home made banana bread with chocolate chips.

Kudos to my jeep.  I was a little leery about a 7 hour drive today and wondered if I would have some kind of engine trouble.  Nary a peep.  The jeep performed like a champ so Sahara Motors did their job well.

I pulled into Torrey, Utah around 2:30 pm.  My GPS led me past my motel for the next three nights, Capitol Reef Resort.  It does that sometime even though I typed in a street address.   The resort is a pretty large place where they even have tepees in which you may stay.  The photos of the insides of the tepees show a luxurious interior.  Glorified tent camping.  My room is a little more mundane – typical motel room but the view out the window is worth the price of the motel.

Instead of checking in immediately, I decided to head to the visitor center of Capitol Reef  National Park, some 6 miles from the motel.  The scenery leading into Torrey was pretty nice but when you enter the park, you are blown away.

Have you ever thought what it would be like to be able to drive through the Grand Canyon?  The drive to the visitor center is pretty much like that.  Sheer cliff walls rising hundreds of feet over you with amazingly vivid colors of reds, oranges, whites, and purple.  

The stop at the visitor center allowed you to view two beautiful formations.  One is named The Castle and I suppose it could look something like one.  

The other is a massive rock wall hundreds of feet high.

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Also, across the road from Panorama Point is an area known as Fluted Wall.  I assume the parts at the base of the cliffs is where it gets its name.

From Panorama Point, you can take a side road to Gooseneck – a deep canyon overlook where a creek has eroded 800 feet down into the canyon.

Next up was The Chimney.  There is a loop trail I may try while here, but it is 7.6 miles.  I’ll have to think about that.

Another striking feature was Twin Rocks.  They are much larger than they seem in the photo and you wonder how long they’ll be balanced there.  

There are a couple of scenic drives I would like to take tomorrow and maybe do a few short hikes.  The following day I may attempt The Chimney loop or some other longer trail.  The section of the park I am in is called Fruita (there was a settlement here at one time with lots of fruit trees).  They have a campground and several areas of interest.  The northern section of the park is called the Cathedral Section and the southern section is called Muley Twist.  

The lower section of the park abuts The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.  I hope that I might get down for a drive through to that area, maybe tomorrow.

In 2014, Nancy, Michel and I flew over Capitol Reef with a Tauck Tour.  Flying over the park certainly gives you an interesting perspective but driving through the park is spectacular.  Every where you look is another beautiful rock formation.