Utah: Adventure in Moab (Part 1)

This week we’ll be jumping forward in time to only a few days ago! The month of September for Jay is very busy at Canyon Explorations. When he was given the opportunity to take a half week off, we jumped and started planning a trip to Colorado. Jay had a hike he wanted to do, we were excited to see fall leaf colors, and it was going to be our first visit to Durango. A few days before we were suppose to go, my father told me there was a snow storm moving in to the area we were going to be visiting. The first two nights we were going to be in the Silverton, CO area where it was going to be below 30 degrees. We went through so many different options to try to make it a comfortable trip but settled on just changing the location and maybe trying a Colorado trip later.

Originally we tried to make a trip to Brian Head, UT work so we could still see fall leaf color, but found that it was also going to be too cold at night in that area. Arches National Park was on our list of parks to one day visit so we decided on visiting the Moab area and forgo the leaf peeping! On Wednesday Jay worked a half day so we got going a little late, and since we arrived when it was dark, we chose the fastest to get to camping area to stay at that night that was still in the Moab area. Side note, for this trip we decided to take the frame out and just use tents, but my single tent doesn’t fit my Exped Mega Mat so I rented one from Peace Surplus, which to be honest was part of the reason we got driving a bit late, and above is a shot at the camping site we stayed at for most of the trip showing our new car camping set up. After getting a bit lost we stayed at a camping site on BLM land called Yellow Circle Road that seems to be a very popular for not being that appealing of a spot.

The next morning we woke up, packed up, and made our way to Arches for the day. On our way to the park, Jay and I came to an embarrassing realization: we left our annual park pass in the other car. Since at the time we figured we’d visit the other parks in the area, we decided to just get another pass. Our first stop was the Double Arch, Turret Arch, and the North and South Windows. The park wasn’t majorly busy but the parking lots at popular arch spots were still packed so we parked on a shoulder that others seemed to be parking on as you exit the parking lot. The Double Arch is about a half mile walk down a well groomed path and is easily the most grand in this spot. Photo Credit for photos below: Sarah marsh

It’s still new to me to be in this environment where red rocks seem to just spring up from flat ground around them and tower over you while the rest of the environment is desert. Before living out west I had never really spent much time in arid environments because the east is very humid and lush. The most similar place I’ve been to that I can compare the arid dry environment of parts of Utah and Arizona is Haleakala in Maui, HI. It’s dry with many different rock and dirt compositions, and differs with it being primarily composed of volcanic mounds, but the color palette and aridness is somewhat similar between the two. If you haven’t heard of Haleakala head over to this post of mine to read about our adventure there several years ago to get an idea of the place I’m talking about, and its definitely a place worth visiting for site-seeing, sunrise viewing, or backpacking like we did.

We next walked back across the parking lot and over to the turret arch. It had a slightly different formation and was smaller, making it easier to climb into. A bit farther down the path are the windows. We only ended up walking over to the South Window and then took the primitive path back to the parking lot because we figured there’d be less people so we’d have a more peaceful experience in the park for a little while. To our surprise, once you walk around the back of the South Window, you’re able to see both windows (arches really) that look like two rock eyes staring back at you. It really brought me back to my high school days because it reminded me of the Great Gatsby. The primitive trail offers a quiet walk back to the car with a variety of plants. When there are no wildflowers I resort to taking photos of all sorts of plants.

Once back to the car we ate some snacks and got back on the road to drive farther into the park. We decided to skip Delicate Arch- the most popular arch in the park, and that is known for being on the Utah license plate- because it was mid day and didn’t really want to deal with a ton of people. We decided to do an early morning with a sunrise at Delicate Arch later on in our adventure, so we continued on to the Devils Garden area to do another small walk to see more arches. The arches seen down the trails starting at the Devil’s Garden Trailhead seemed very popular so we decided to walk the trail within the Devil’s Garden Campground that brings you to the not as popular Broken and Tapestry Arches.

While walking this trail we only came upon three other groups of people so it was SO worth it. The Broken Arch is in fact not broken at all and actually confused Jay making him to continue past it to look for a broken arch. It does look like there is a crack through the top of the arch where two rocks are just pressing up against each other. We then walked to Tapestry Arch area. I personally didn’t walk up to Tapestry Arch and instead climbed up a rock tower to get a view of the arch and surrounding area while Jay went over to the arch to explore.

After this walk we went in to town to get some food. A few weeks back Jay hiked the brother of one of the guides who works at Canyon Explorations into the Grand Canyon to meet up with one of the river rafting trips the brother was on. Apparently the brother of the guide owns two restaurants in Moab so we decided to support one of them, specifically the Pho one that has philly cheese steaks- owner is from Philly- since that’s what Jay was craving that night. I was surprisingly pleased to find many vegan, dairy free, and gluten free options since that isn’t always the case at restaurants.

After eating we made our way out of town and down Potash road to find a dispersed camping site we found on Campendium. While reading the reviews we found that the access wasn’t fantastic in to the site but that a Honda Accord had made it in so we figured we could too. When we reached the turn off to the site we saw the boulders that the reviews had warned about, but couldn’t find even a good spot to drive in, and couldn’t even see the road into the site, so we gave up and went back down the road to find a spot at one of the fee camping areas we’d passed. We thankfully got one of the two last sites available and turned out to be the last site since a couple drove in at the same time and took the other one. We ended up making friends with the neighbors who drove in at the same time because we were gawking at their A-Frame camper as they were popping it up. After social distance socializing for awhile with them we went to sleep in our separate tents and I fell asleep toasty under my many blankets since my sleeping bag is only a 35 degree- 0 degree is on my eventual gear purchase list.

So it seems like this adventure will be covered in either two or three parts, more likely the latter since this whole post ended up only covering one day of the adventure. Hope this first part has already convinced you to eventually visit Arches National Park and Moab, go back if you’ve already visited, or appreciate National Parks even more for protecting these beautiful natural features! See you next week with part two!

Mahalo and Kia Ora!