Every week I have the good intention of doing the blog on a
weekly basis and then time gets away from me.
I wind up getting behind in my picture editing. And then we are off
again on another adventure. So here is a synopsis of the last 3 weeks:
We’ve gone to some new places in the last couple of weeks
and returned to some others. We drove on Highway 12 (3 weeks ago , 8/6) and saw
the east side of Bryce Canyon and explored the town of Tropic (bigger than
Hatch). Then we went further south to Kodachrome State Park and on to Grosvenor
Arch.
Both were named by the National Geographic Society. The road
to the arch was quite an adventure, beginning with a sign that says”Impassable
when wet”. It was not bad except for a very muddy wash that we had fun sliding
across. Rain was threatening but we made it there and back before the
rain. We were stopped by a couple from
France that asked us if that was the best way to get to Kanab from Bryce
Canyon. They were in a very low clearance sedan and their GPS routed them that
way. (I can’t get our GPS to route us anyway but over paved roads!) We advised
them to turn around ….. it was a shorter route but would take a lot longer and
they might get stuck…..that wash was steep and muddy. Many people have told us GPS doesn’t work well
around here….supposedly the canyons have something to do with it along with bad co-ordinates.
We passed on Kodachrome Basin and went back towards Hatch. We
stopped at the historical marker for Bryce Canyon Airport…very
interesting. The hanger was built in
1936, by the WPA, out of native ponderosa pine and is on the National Register
of Historic Places. Flight 608 crashed here on Oct 24, 1947. It ended
tragically but it was the first time a plane was reconstructed to determine the
cause of the crash. As a result a critical design flaw was discovered in the
DC-6 and all 80 planes were grounded and repaired, including President
Truman’s. Pictures of Bryce Airport
We drove north off the highway and explored the road to
Casto and Losee Canyon. The hikes up
these are pretty long but we noticed a sign for the Arches Trail…it said it was
only .7 miles long with 14 arches and lots of hoodoos…… just my speed! Pictures of Casto canyon
We went hiking up Arches trail the next day and it was as
advertised, probably did see 14 arches, some very small…windows actually …..
and beautiful.
We topped our week off with an amazing sunrise
The next week (8/14) we went back to Pine Lake with the kayak and had fun paddling around and fishing. Lucy had a great time, sitting right in front of me like a pro. The fishing would have been better later in the day but we've been having major thunderstorms every afternoon so we’ll wait and lake fish in September and October. We came back a different way and did some off-roading and enjoyed the view of a field of sunflowers on the way back.
During the week we heard from friends from San Carlos, Tony and Marquita, saying they were coming our way. They
stopped at the north rim of the Grand Canyon and got to our place Sunday
afternoon.
So Monday we went hiking up the Arches trail, stopped at the
visitor’s center in Red Canyon and then on to Bryce …….
The visitor’s center had a wonderful story about the Quilt
Walk in the winter of 1864-65. The early Mormon settlers in Panguitch (just
north of here) were starving and trying to survive their 1st winter.
They decided to set out for Parowan (40 miles to the west) for supplies. They
had to abandon their ox and cart to the deep snow and were soon foundering in
the snow themselves. They laid out their quilts to pray and realized that they
weren’t sinking into the snow. They used
the quilts to walk on the snow all the way to Parowan and back. Here is a link
to the story:
The quilt walk story
The quilt walk story
We had a great time with Tony and Marquita and had fun
helping them plan the rest of their trip through southern Utah, Colorado, northern
Arizona and New Mexico. We meet so many
people in our travels and love visiting them when we are traveling. But it is really wonderful when they get to
visit us and we get to show them some of our favorite places.
They left on Tuesday to continue on Hwy 12 east through Escalante
National Monument and Capitol Reef National Park and we headed west to Cedar
Breaks National Monument. We decided to see a part of the area we haven’t seen
yet.
It’s geography is similar to Bryce but the amphitheater of
formations is huge! It is over 2,000 feet deep
and over 3 miles in diameter. The
monument was established in 1933 but was part of a tour of southern Utah parks
that was conducted by the Union Pacific since the early 1920s. All the parks
were connected by railroad or bus. Tourists would be driven from park to park
and stayed each night at a different lodge. The lodge at Cedar Breaks was built
in 1923 and stood until 1972 and was famous for its fried chicken dinner. There are lots of high mountain meadows and
hiking trails.
Link to Cedar Breaks National Monument
Link to Cedar Breaks National Monument
As soon as you go through the monument you are in Brian Head
which is a ski area. The road down the “hill” into Parowan is a 13% grade for
something like six miles! I can’t imagine how anyone gets up the road in the
winter to ski. Pictures of Brian Head
We meet so many great people in our job…..we enjoy sharing
our experiences here with people traveling through, describing the beauty of
this place. And here is an example of a really
adventuresome person traveling through the area .........
adventuresome person traveling through the area .........
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We leave you with this quote:
"Ever'thing there is but lovin' leaves a rust on yo' soul"
Langston Hughes
Jim and Becky
"Ever'thing there is but lovin' leaves a rust on yo' soul"
Langston Hughes
Jim and Becky
