Month: November 2018

Tripometer – 11,091 mi

Gas Gauge –  847.866 gal

Location –Wahweap RV & Campground, Page, AZ

Lodging – $30

Cans of OFF – 4

We bid goodbye to Stratis this morning as he heads back to reality and responsibility in Pittsburgh. Kelly, Paul, and Dave headed off on the especially long drive to the Grand Canyon North Rim. It’s a two and a half hour journey into the park from Page, AZ but on the up side we woke up this morning and enjoyed coffee in the upper 40s instead of the mid 30s. Today’s drive is taking us through a very large open expanse of desert, much of it within the boundaries of the Navajo Nation Indian Reservation. Kelly enjoyed stopping at quite a few different Indian jewelry kiosks along our route today.

The first set of kiosks that we encountered today were almost at the peak of a pass across the top of a mesa. As Kelly perused the Navajo wares, David and Paul discussed the route we were going to take to the Grand Canyon. From our viewpoint parked along the highway at the pass, Paul was able to point at destinations over an hour away. The tremendous distances that you can see in the southwest are amazing. There have been more than a few instances where we believe we can see objects 100 miles away in several different directions at once, often not from a high vantage point.

  

We stopped by a few tourist destinations on our way including Navajo Bridge (old and new) which cross the Colorado river at Lee’s Landing. Our lunch was packed this morning and we stopped to eat at an old tourist trap which now looks more like an ancient Native American stone building than a modern day building, but we were assured by the internet that the old structure was built in the early 1900s. Either way it made for a fantastic place to eat.

  

We knew from the weather forecast that the North Rim area would be cold due to elevation, but we were not prepared for the lush pine forest that surrounds the entire area. We’ve been in the desert for well over two weeks now, it’s been so long since we’ve seen proper forest that this took us by surprise. The North Rim Visitor’s Center lies at just below 9000 feet in elevation and the vegetation could not be more different from the Page, AZ area where we’re staying. To be honest, at this point, it was a nice change to see. We are loving the southwest and the tremendous canyon structures that dominate the skyline, but deep in our hearts we’re forest people and this area feels much more like home.

  

Getting out of the car at the Grand Canyon we had certain expectations, all of us. We have grown up seeing pictures and hearing people talk of the Grand Canyon but none of us have ever seen it in person. We were absolutely dumbfounded at the sight. Perhaps our minds naturally diminish descriptions and pictures of spectacular sights, but the Grand Canyon is so much bigger, deeper, colorful, and generally more spectacular than what the three of us expected. There have been more than a few destinations that we have visited that didn’t live up to the hype. The Grand Canyon shattered our expectations and left our mouths hanging agape. So much so that Paul and Dave both set aside the ‘no closer than 5’ to certain death’ rule, as were many other people visiting the Grand Canyon.

  

Arriving late in the day to be touring a national park, we chose to run from one overlook trail to the next trying to absorb as much of the sights as possible before the sun set. Almost every overlook trail was within inches of a drop-off of over 1000 feet. Kelly, being the only non-agoraphobic person with us today, was dumbfounded not at our fear of heights (or of falling as Paul and Dave would say) but at the sheer number of people who were obviously struggling with the heights. If one assumes that a fair chunk of the population wouldn’t even attempt some of the trails we were on, of the people on the trails roughly half were visibly distressed by the hike they were taking. When one side of the trail was towards the cliff and the other towards a wall, there was a steady stream of traffic moving in both directions on the trail that refused to leave the side of the trail against the secure wall. (Sometimes this was Paul and Dave).

While we were all frustrated that we only had a few hours to spend at the park before dark, we stayed until the sun set, grabbing more than a few stunning sunset pictures of the Grand Canyon. The opening that can be seen in the canyon wall above is called Angels Window. The Grand Canyon left all of us somewhat speechless and very humbled.

The drive home was stressful. It was yet another level of the driving video game through dark, rain, fog, mountains, desert, highways, and forest roads all containing mule deer near or on the roadways. 3 hours later we finally made it home much to everyone’s delight.

 

Tripometer – 10,787 mi

Gas Gauge –  836.564 gal

Location –Wahweap RV & Campground, Page, AZ

Lodging – $30

Cans of OFF – 4

We all heard the rain start during the night/sometime in the very early morning. It was hard enough that we all, at one point in the night, mentally evaluated our distance from the little river we were camped near. Our fears were easily quelled by looking out the window to still see the lights of the trailer that was CLOSER to the river. We woke early this morning with the intent of getting a good start on Bryce Canyon. Coffee was had underneath the awning out of the rain in a 2 inch puddle of mud that seemed to have no intention of draining anytime soon. David and Stratis both made an attempt at an impromptu drainage system, but just ended up getting muddier in the process. After seeing that the same weather system we were in was sitting on top of Bryce Canyon producing a rain / snow slush at roughly 32 degrees, we decided to reevaluate our situation over a hot breakfast in town.

The weather cleared as we drove into Kanab. It was still largely overcast but this glimpse of clear weather and the 5 degree temperature increase we experienced driving down in elevation instantly brought spirits up. There was only one well rated café in town that was serving a lite breakfast. The quiche Florentine and Bavarian mocha lattes were the stars of the show. We ate breakfast outside the café underneath a gas space heater and were happy to do it. Across the street from the café was an old Hollywood set. Some quick Googling told us that Kanab and nearby Johnson Canyon were the primary filming locations for the television series Gunsmoke.

After getting a taste of warm and dry we all decided to bail on Bryce Canyon and proceed immediately to Lake Powell where the sun is shining and the temperatures are in the mid 70s. There was only one piece of business remaining, we have to go pack up camp and drag it out of the mid pit. Thankfully the rain had stopped by the time we got back to camp but By the time we got the trailers packed up and hitched up, Paul and Stratis were caked in pasty mud to their knees and elbows.

Towing the trailer out of the mid pit was not a straightforward task. The first attempt was a slow careful pull towards the road while avoiding the largest puddles. The rig made it about 10 feet before we realized this was likely not going to work in its current form. We managed to move the truck onto a grassy patch to get some traction but sunk one of the 4 Runner tires into a prairie dog hole in the process. We disconnected the trailer from the truck, got the truck out of the prairie dog hole, and reattached the truck pointing straight at the hard packed road surface at the edge of the campsite. We all knew we had to get this rig out this time or we were stuck here for the day at a minimum. Stratis had the good sense to film the escape from the mud pit. When watching, be sure to not miss the trailer fishtail a little bit right before it finally gets up onto the road. We all felt a sense of victory when Kelly finally got the rig on hard ground!

The trip to Lake Powell was entirely uneventful, thankfully. We didn’t pick Lake Powell as a particularly attractive destination, but when we arrived we were blown away by our campsite. Situated on a hill overlooking Lake Powell, we had a commanding view of the hills, mesas and caves on the far shore. One of the top things to do in Lake Powell is to rent a huge houseboat for the week and take the whole family to a remote section of the lake to swim and play on the lake in relative seclusion. These houseboats dotted the lake and far shoreline and could be heard occasionally blowing their horns at one another throughout the day. After we got camp set up Kelly, Dave and Stratis took Ranger swimming for the first time since Oregon. Boy was that overdue!

Not feeling like cooking tonight after moving, we went into Page, AZ for dinner at a local BBQ joint. There was a live country band and tourists everywhere so the wait for dinner was quite long. While we waited for dinner we enjoyed the antics of a surprisingly large concentration of German tourists as they posed for pictures with the American flag, the cowboy statue, the BBQ grills, the band, the peanut buckets, the beer cooler, etc… As we ate our meal of ribs and pulled pork the two German tourists seated next to us made very little effort to resist the urge to stare at us out of the corner of their eyes during the entire meal. We think they were especially fascinated by us eating the BBQ ribs with our hands, but either way we were definitely part of the tourist attraction for them.

  

Tripometer – 10,645 mi

Gas Gauge –  820.974 gal

Location –Twin Hollows Campground, Mt Carmel, UT

Lodging – FREE

Cans of OFF – 4

With last night’s realization that the temperatures at the Grand Canyon will be too cold to camp, we’ve booked a site at Wahweap Campground in the Lake Powell Recreation area for Friday night through the remainder of Dave’s stay and a little bit beyond. The temperatures at Lake Powell will be a much more reasonable mid 60s to mid 40s range for the next few days. This unseasonably cold weather is not what any of us had planned on but spirits are high. Bryce Canyon is still on the plan for tomorrow but it’s going to be cold with a chance of rain. Stratis decided to head up to Bryce Canyon this morning to do some photography at sunrise.

  

What an amazing place. We can’t begin to convey the beauty of this park in words and can only try to approximate it with photos. The sun was at full strength today and Ranger got dropped off at doggy daycare early (for us). We jumped on the shuttle to the northern park and thrilled at the spectacle of driving through the lush green and red canyon walls.

  

The shuttle dropped us off at the farthest point along the valley, the base of the same trail that Stratis took the day before. Dodging a few hundred other tourists in the process we made our way up the Riverwalk Trail to where the pavement ends and the ‘true’ river walk begins. The paved trail wound its way up the canyon as it narrows from several hundred feet between the walls to about 20 feet where the pavement ends. There is a picture of the end of the trail above. Those with the ability and desire can continue up river through the Zion Narrows and beyond. Many tourists had rented waders and hiking poles in town to do exactly that. It looked like a ton of fun but, perhaps better left for a warmer day when we don’t have a dog in the kennel.

  

We spent the afternoon stopping at various shuttle stops and hiking the trails that lead to some of the specific attractions in the park. It seemed to us that the beauty of the canyon on our way to the end of the trail was always more exhilarating than the destination itself. Zion is known for some of its hiking trails with amazing views and tremendous drop-offs. Both Paul and Dave have trouble with heights, so for once in this trip the ruling consensus was to not get within 5’ of certain death.

Sadly, the doggy daycare we put Ranger into closes at 5:30pm and we had to scurry out of the park more quickly than any of us would have liked. We picked up a tired doggy from daycare. The staff there showed Kelly videos of Ranger playing with several dogs of various sizes. It seemed to work out well for everyone today!