Sept 10 - on to Moab, Utah and Arches National Park

    The landscape along our route to Utah has really changed.  It is now semi-arid, and not so mountainous.  I do believe we went downhill for 100 miles.  More open plains, with not much in them, even plants.  The colors have all faded, and what mountains there are have mostly flat tops.  Not a very inviting place to live, if you ask me.  We did stop in Palisades, CO, known for their peaches, for gas and I did buy some sweet corn at the peach/produce stand.

   Our Spanish Trail RV Park campground in Moab, Utah is definitely the parking lot variety of RV parks - the very tight parking lot type.  And, even though it is sweltering in the hot sun, from 11am to 5:30pm, there is very little shade in our site.  The RV AC has a hard time keeping the RV cool, even with all of the shades pulled.  So, we set up the RV, hung out for a bit, sweating, and by this time, it was 5:30pm.  We decided to go over to Arches National Park and explore a bit.  The park info says the best time to go is early morning and late afternoon/sunset.  

   I am VERY impressed with Arches National Park.  The roads are well made, go up steep switchbacks, are well marked, with a lot of pull over areas.  You can tell they handle millions of people a year.  We drove up the main road, and stopped at all of  the viewing areas.  The rock formations are breathtaking from a distance, and even more so up close.  The colors of the rock, and the layers, and the way they jut up out of the ground, forming "fins" and walls of rock outcroppings.  Each one is more amazing than the last.  I'm sure Claire could explain the geology of it all, as she did her field study here when she was at Colorado School of Mines.  

   We stopped at:  

• The Moab Fault site - shows the actual split in the earth along the fault 
• The Park Avenue Viewpoint - this is a canyon with tall, interesting formations lining both sides, making it look like an avenue.
• LaSal Mountain viewpoint - so behind all of the low red mountains surrounding Moab, rises up the LaSal mountains very majestically behind them.
• The Courthouse Towers Viewpoint with the Tower of Babel, The Organ, the Three Gossips, and the Sheep Rock formations.  

By this time, the sun was setting, and it had cooled off very nicely.  So we returned to the RV, had dinner and went to bed sort of early.  A long, but delightful day.

Arriving in Utah photo:

Arches National Park photos (lots);

Park Ave

Courthouse & 3 Gossips