Saturday April 17th after 10 states we roll into
Utah. We decided to take rt. 128 for a more scenic ride
to
Moab from interstate 70. Here you see the Colorado river
winding near Fisher valley. The towers are called
Fisher Towers
and barely in the distance you see the snow of the La Sal
mts.
|
 |
Sunday the 18th of April
I decided to rent a mt. bike and ride some of the famous trails
around Moab.
Most people take shuttles to the trail heads. I
decided I would ride the 9 mile climb to the head of the 19
mile
trail. If you look real close in this picture you can see a
small patch of blue/white in the
valley where the green stops
and the brown begins - that's the town of Moab. The ride here wasn't
all that
exciting, though I got passed by lots of Jeeps heading
out to go 4 wheeling. I also passed the Lion's
back. It's
a slick rock formation some woman rolled her jeep off of a few years
ago. You may have seen it
on
tv.
|
 |
A few miles into the
trail (the name of the trail was the Porcupine Rim trail) there was
an overlook. To my
surprise it looked into Fisher Valley - the
valley we drove near on the way in. Here is a large rock
formation
in the middles of the
valley.
|
 |
Another shot of Fisher
Valley from the Porcupine Rim trail. Here you see the Fisher Towers
and Fisher
Mesa.
|
 |
Some guy offered to take
my picture with the
view.
|
 |
At the
bottom of the 11 mile decent I could see some guy sitting in a
chair facing up the trail with an
umbrella over him. I
realized right away it was some photo shop from town taking
pictures of what must
have been a jump.
Sure enough when I got close there was a bump. This was the
result.
|
 |
After the ride we piled
back into David's Land Rover (you'd think we had enough of this
thing) and went for
a little 4 wheeling trip in the La Sal
mts.
|
 |
Here's a clear shot of
the La Sal mts. They soar to over 12, 000ft. We were trying to
drive the La Sal pass
trail which would have taken us to
10,600ft, but snow and another stuck truck turned us
back.
|
 |
Monday the 19th we got
up early and headed to Canyonlands National Park. The park is about
an hour
south of Moab. On the way in we stopped at
Newspaper Rock. Most of what you see is ancient indian
drawings, but some is modern graffiti.
|
 |
From the entrance road of the park you
see two features like the one below. They are called North and
South Six Shooter peaks. I think this one is South Six
Shooter. I think it's hight was around 6,500ft. Base
elevation
may have been 5,000 ft.
|
 |
Once in the park the
landscape quickly changes. Outside the park most things are open
range lands with
hills/mt.s and mesas here and there. In
Canyonlands you quickly learn why it's called what it is. It's like
giant english muffin made of rock and sand. There are nooks and
crannies and canyons running every
which way. Most of what
you see is formed from wind erosion, though when it rains it
has a significant
impact as well.
|
 |
Next Page
|
