Arches is another of Utah's five great national parks, and it is unique and beautiful in its own right.
Our drive over took us through several changes in terrain. We pulled over at this rest stop which included a view of Castle Valley, which we learned was the last place Brigham Young called on his Mormon people to settle. They were looking for grazing land for livestock. Not much of it to be found here, I'm afraid. Beauty...but of another kind. Grazing land and water were not part of the picture.
The rest stops in Arizona and Utah generally include some local Indian vendors selling an array of pottery, jewelry and other tchotchkes. 
The drive also included several nail-biting mountain grades such as this one. 
When describing this particular grade, our mountain directory alerted us of the runaway truck ramp by saying, "The first escape ramp exits to the right and goes uphill. It is rather short and there is a vertical rock wall that rises from the end of the ramp. So if the gravel bed doesn't stop you, the rock wall gets a chance." That just tickled me. 
Finally we arrived at Portal RV Resort. The red cliffs of the region are on one side of us and the Colorado River runs on the other. 
The Colorado is actually overflowing its banks right now with the snowmelt. Coming from drought-stricken Texas, its a beautiful site to see.
We have heard a lot of foreign languages spoken in this park while we've been here. On more than one occasion we greeted our neighbors with a good ol' Texas, "Hi, how are ya?" and received "Thank you" as a response. They had no idea what we were saying. I was out walking one morning and found this young woman on a conference call...in a foreign language. From her tone of voice, I am guessing it was a business call and not a personal one. Just goes to show what a difference technology has made in the workplace.
This campground has been interesting in another respect in that the water pressure is over 100 psi. Max said that's more than you generally have in your home! The water lines in our Turtle are geared for up to about 60 psi but really shouldn't have more than that in them. We always have at least one water pressure regulator on our lines, but as luck would have it, we have been having trouble with our big one and have had to use our little Wal-Mart cheapie at the last park or two. We felt very uneasy only having that $10 cheapie as our stop gap between 100 psi and a flood in our basement. After a few phone calls with the manufacturer and a bit of work, though, Max got it fixed. I think we both slept better after that. Max said a lot of people run all the time with just those "cheapies", but as you've probably gathered if you know us very well, we both tend to be a bit overly cautious. Or worry warts. Whatever you want to call it. I'll own it. :)
They also have biting gnats here. We got here just in time for their "season". I won't post a picture. They haven't bothered Max too much but suffice it to say they seem to think I'm pretty tasty.
Now on to Arches--the star attraction!
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| We were hiking up to this one but stopped a ways before we got to it. There were a lot of people already there and they seemed to enjoy shouting just to hear their voices echo, I guess. Wasn't really the peaceful communing with nature I had imagined. |
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| Some of these rocks had names. We enjoyed making up our own. We called this one the Face of Geronimo. |
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| The world's biggest chiminea. |
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| The bow of the Titanic |
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| Look at the sand! It's easy to see how they say sand, wind, water and time is what made these rocks what they are today. |
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| This certainly caught our attention. Thank goodness we never heard any strange noises... |
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| What keeps that thing from falling??!!
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| Geared up and ready to go. |
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| We loaded into Rangers and off we went. The drive up the mountain was quite an experience in itself. What you see from a distance that looks like a red mountain, you discover is covered in huge, BUMPY rocks. |
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| The first "practice" line. Max is looking it over very closely... |
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| We made it across that one, and then had to walk across the crest of the mountain to the next one. That was kind of nerve wracking, too. Where are the guard rails? |
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| Max coming in for a landing. |
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| Karen, here's a bike trail for you. |
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| The suspension bridge. The guide in back thought he should demonstrate how it was okay to make it bounce. Not funny, Mr. Guide. |
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| This was one of the longer runs--1200 feet. Ravens Rim said they are the only company they know of where you zip from natural rock rather than man-built platforms. Kind of cool. |
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| The longest run--1300 feet. They said depending upon your weight, you get to going about 35 mph across this one. Max said due to his "bulk", he probably went 45 mph. :) |
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| We lived! We did it! Then we had to get off that mountain. It was just as bumpy going down. There were moments when we felt we were headed STRAIGHT down. I was too busy hanging on to take pictures at those moments. But this gives you a bit of an idea. |
If you ever get a chance to go zip lining, I recommend it!
Today we drove out to the Red Cliffs Lodge and Movie Museum. The drive was beautiful, and we're big movie buffs so the museum was fascinating. It's amazing how many movies have been made in and around the Moab area. (It's known is "John Ford Country" because he loved making movies out here.) Cheyenne Autumn, Rio Grande, Wagonmaster and Geronimo were just a few that had scenes filmed in Professor Valley, the area around where the ranch is located. 
There were also scenes from Forest Gump, Back to the Future II and III, City Slickers II, and Thelma and Louise, to name a few others, filmed here. The pic to the left is the mannequin for Thelma in the movie. It was in the car that went over the cliff at what is now known as "Thelma and Louise Point". LOL |
| The ranch includes cabins, a restaurant, a winery, and provides facilities for rafting, horseback riding, and it seems just about anything you would want to do in the outdoors in this area. They have it all figured out. |
Beautiful. We go away with many wonderful memories of the Utah national parks. Max said his favorite was probably Zion; he liked being able to get up close and personal down in the canyon. I would say Bryce was my favorite; I'm a hoodoo fan.
We had hoped to see the north rim of the Grand Canyon but didn't get a chance because they've had some wildfires going on there, as well. Oh well. Gives us a reason to come back to this area again some day.
Tomorrow we're off to Provo where we will explore the great Salt Lake area.
Until next time....take care!
Max and Paula
