2009 – Week 9




June 11, 2009, Thursday:
It was overcast this morning, and we were fearful that the sun would never come out. However, when I took Daisy for her 2nd walk, there was blue sky to the west. The plan for the day was to hike the Navaho Trail loop from Sunset Point, a distance of 1.3 miles with a vertical drop and climb of 550 feet. After that we would take the bus to Bryce Point from where we would take the Rim Trail 2.2 miles north, returning to Sunset Point. It would be an easier day than yesterday and leaves us a 13-mile drive south to Rainbow Point tomorrow. The trip on Navaho Trail was the one that Susie really wanted to do because it took us through deep and narrow slots between tall and narrow rock fins that she remembered from 2003.



The Park suggested that we take the loop in a clockwise direction and so we did. The walls are deep red, and the area between the fins is covered with sand from the eroded sandstone. As we traveled in the bottom of the Bryce Amphitheatre, we noticed the areas of runoff from the heavy but infrequent rainstorms and snowmelt. We also noticed, because we were close to the rock, the mud drippings from the eroding soft rock above. In a way, some of these rock fins looked like sand castles that we made on the ocean beaches years ago.



When we finished the Navaho Trail, we jumped on the shuttle bus and went to Bryce Point. We were lucky enough to be able to talk with a Park Volunteer, a young man who with his girl friend are touring the country and volunteering at as many parks as possible. Susie had the opportunity to ask and get responses to several questions that have bothering her for the last few days. We parted company at Bryce Point, and we headed north along the Rim Trail. We saw a dead tree we had photographed in 2003 and re-photographed it this year. We also saw the small overlook where Susie and I sat in 2003 while another park visitor took our picture. I have to check, but I think the stone has eroded considerably in the 6 years. Neither of us wanted to go out there this time even if there was someone who was willing to take a picture. During the hike we looked out to the west and noticed another area of red cliffs and when we looked through the binoculars, the rock formations were the same as in Bryce Canyon. Looking east, the view reminded me of an ocean storm. The green trees and white sandstone cliffs were breaking waves. I took several pictures; maybe one will come out well.
We completed the hike, and Susie wanted to go to the Visitor Center in the hope of finding a knowledgeable tree person. I stayed at Sunset Point. On the bus, she saw the same Park Volunteer as before, and he took her into the Visitor Center and introduced her to the right person. The chemistry between them must have been perfect because Susie came back to get me at Sunset Point with a bigger than big smile on her face. Lots of answers and explanations. It will be good to leave the Park with such remembrances. The skies were partly cloudy all day and into the evening. The winds were blowing from the west, and the humidity was low.

June 12, 2009 Friday:
At 8:30am this morning were headed out and turned south to Rainbow Point, the far end of the Park, or at least as far as the road took us (13 miles all uphill). The views were different, but wonderful. The amount of erosion that caused the development of the hoodoos at the Bryce Amphitheatre was not as great here, but we could see hoodoos in the making. We had breakfast at Rainbow Point and then headed north stopping at each of the 8 overlooks.
We met a couple from Virginia, they had also driven out here, and at every stop there they were. Finally we had to stop talking otherwise we would still be there. They were headed to Moab UT, a trip of about 270 miles, in the afternoon. We finished the trip and stopped to dump waste and fill with water before heading to the showers. We scrubbed and rinsed and scrubbed and rinsed before the timers shut off the water. My ten minutes was shorter than Susie’s ten minutes. We continued north and stopped at Ruby’s Inn, just outside the Park. Before the park was a Park, one family had moved to the area and bought a ranch. They didn’t know anything about the hoodoos, but when they found out, they built a small Inn and the business grew. When the park became the Park, the Inn was inside the Park boundary, so they built another, and have created a vast business complex including motels, restaurants, general store, auto and truck repair facilities and so forth. The Park Service runs its shuttle busses through the area to collect passengers. This is same procedure that was used at Zion NP. We had lunch there before heading east on UT12 into the northeastern portion of the Grand Staircase-Escalante NM. UT12 is the first America’s Scenic Byway in the State of Utah. We were able to see many of the features that we had seen from Bryce Canyon NP, but from the eastern edge. The name John Wesley Powell popped up again. He was the first person to successfully traverse the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. Here, he has a very visible peak at the bluff of south end of a mesa named after him. It tops out at 10,000+ feet and was very visible from all of Zion NP. We continued through the Grand Staircase-Escalante NP seeing farming aided by irrigation, sheer cliffs of different colors and shapes and cottonwood trees along stream edges. We stopped by a road sign information panel, and it identified 2 storage bins that the Fremont Indians had used during the 1050AD to 1200AD period. We started looking for campgrounds and found the Calf Creek Campground run by the BLM. It was full, but the volunteer Host put us in a spot, and said we could stay for 2 nights. We took Daisy for a swim in the cold Calf Creek until she decided she wanted food more than cold water. We had dinner and went to bed early.
It has been a pretty intense couple of weeks. Even though we have been most of these places before, we are digging deeper for information. I think we’ll try to have a relaxed day tomorrow before heading out Sunday morning. We have a pretty full schedule until the first week in July; then it eases off.

June 13, 2009 Saturday:
W decided to leave this morning due to heavy fire pit smoke and late night noise from the younger set. This Campsite is a very busy place, probably because of Calf Creek, the 126-foot waterfall and all the other hiking trails in the area. I took Daisy for another swim, and Susie went to identify some flowers she had seen last night. For some reason, Calf Creek seemed much colder this morning than last night, so it was a short swim. We left the Campground at 10:00am and headed north on UT12 towards Price UT. We didn’t expect to make it in one day, as there is wonderful scenery along the way. As a side note, we try to hold up traffic as we travel, but today I drove into what I thought was a pulloff, but it was a short abandoned piece of road with no turnaround. Pulling out on to the new road was problem due to a blind corner. I’ll be more careful and less accommodating in the future. UT12 follows the top of a very narrow ridge, just enough to a 2 lane road. It was aptly named ‘Hogback Ridge’ and was turned into a road by the CCC in the 1930’s. Completion of the road enabled the town of Boulder Town to have year around mail service by automobile.

Boulder is in a valley and is very productive farming due to the availability of water. We left Boulder and started climbing through the mountains with a top road elevation of 9,600 feet. As we reached the top, we saw lush green meadows and the Henry Mountains to the east. When we rounded a corner we saw Capital Reef NP. The view from the top is awesome with all the different bright colors of rock. We had been through the Park in 2003, but the view from the outside and top said to us that we didn’t need to go through again. We passed through the town of Fremont UT and saw a herd of cattle with unusual markings, or at least they were unusual to us. The cows were all black with a band of white around its belly. We climbed again up to about 8,800 feet before going through Hogan Pass. On the way down, we saw what we thought was a lake, but it was dry. I found out later that is was Paradise Lake, only full in the spring when there is snowmelt water is available. We eventually reached I-70, headed east about 5 miles and then headed north on UT10. UT10 was straight as an arrow for 11+ miles before taking a slight bend to go through the town of Emery, then it ran straight again for another 3+ miles. Not much to avoid out here. We continued to Ferron where we headed west to the Millsite SP. We stopped at 2:45pm after traveling 134 miles. The campsite was full, but for the second night in a row we were allowed to park in ‘overflow’ area. There were four RV’s there. We took Daisy for a swim because she wanted to plus we wanted her to sleep well during the night.
There have been intermittent storms in the area, and we had to pull all the furniture inside because of high winds and rain. All evening the winds blew, the clouds raced across the sky and every so often it rained. I remember reading an article in Sailing World about racing on the Great Salt Lake. If I remember correctly, the winds blew more than 25 knots all the time. I can believe it. When we went to bed it was still blowing.

June 14, 2009 Sunday:
I took Daisy out at 7:00am, and she took another swim. The water temperature was 50 degrees, and she didn’t stay in long. We had an early breakfast and Susie took Daisy for her second walk, and Daisy went in the water again. Before we had a chance to head out, a large RV pulling a flatbed trailer with 5 ATV’s fully loaded with camping gear pulled in. We guessed that they were headed into the hills for an overnight. We left the Campground at 9:30am and continued north along UT10 towards Price, the home of the College of Eastern Utah and its Prehistoric Museum. It bears repeating (in case I didn’t mention it before) that 90 million years ago, the Mancos Sea existed from what is now the Gulf of Mexico to the Artic Ocean. It eventually evaporated, leaving fossils, dinosaur bones, coal deposits and oil shale. This area of UT is a treasure-trove of dinosaur bones and other fossils, and many of the recovered skeletons are found in major museums around the country. While this is a relatively small exhibit, it is well done, and the exhibits are continually updated as new information is uncovered. I remember a few years ago paleontologists decided that they had mismatched a dinosaur head with a dinosaur skeleton. The proper head was discovered by the College of Eastern Utah. We spent 2 hours there and then continued our drive up US191 and US40 to the Dinosaur National Monument. We pulled into the NM and headed to the Green River Campground. The river is full and certainly not green; it is very brown! The Green River starts in the Wind River Range of the Rocky Mountains to the east of Jackson WY and ends by joining the Colorado River in Canyonlands NP in NE UT. The usual storms came roaring through. We tried to eat supper outside, but the showers kept on coming. Finally we caught enough of a break. The Campground has some of the largest cottonwood trees we have seen.
It is not full or noisy so we should have a good night sleep before continuing north to Rock Springs WY.

June 16, 2009 Monday:
We took our time this morning, letting Susie take photos of her drawings. She now has 139 drawings to be posted on her blog. Daisy and I took a walk and she want to swim in the fast flowing Green River but that would be too dirty and dangerous. We left around 11:00am and stopped at the temporary Visitor Center. I had some trouble with the engine shutting down for what seemed no good reason as we tried to leave. Eventually it seemed to recover. The original Visitor Center was built on expansive clay, and after 50 years the structural damage requires demo and re-build. We took a bus to the top of the hill and walked down, looking for fossils. Luckily for us, the staff had marked some fossils, but it still took time to identify the pieces.


We also think we saw some pieces of petrified trees based on the colors of the material. There is a quarry at the site where excavation work is proceeding but it was closed to visitors. The walk took about an hour and off we went, heading towards Rock Springs WY where I wanted a shop to look at the front end that shimmied when we applied the brakes. We were at this shop in 2006 when we had tire trouble and the warranted a return trip based on the work they done previously. We started the climb out of Vernal on US191, and the engine shutdown once again but restarted immediately. Hearts in our throats! We continued on, and everything seemed OK. We climbed to elevation 8,260 feet through numerous switchbacks and were passed by several empty, I assume, 18-wheelers on the way up. We noticed that off to the west of us, there was serious snow on the peaks of the Uinta Mountains which top out at 13,528 feet. We passed along the east side of the Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area after crossing over the dam and finally stopped for lunch. The RV wouldn’t start; everything electrical was dead. We were 60 miles from anything, anywhere, but at least we had cell phone service. I opened the hood, jiggled the battery wires for a lack of anything else to do. Lo and behold it started. We continued along, but it was nerve racking. We finally came to Rock Springs and checked into the RV Park. The engine wouldn’t start again. Opened the hood, jiggled the cables and off we went to our spot. I immediately opened the toolbox, found some wrenches and tried to tighten everything, but I was missing the one I needed. I used an adjustable, but that’s not the best. I’ll try to buy one tomorrow. I don’t understand why the terminal loosened, maybe too much vibration. We cleaned the RV, washed clothes and then ourselves before accessing the internet to see what was new. I downloaded the 8th week blog. We have an appointment at 7:00am tomorrow for the front-end investigation.


June 15, 2009 Tuesday
There are no mountains to the east of us, and the sun came with a bang. I walked Daisy, and we drove to the tire/brake place, arriving at 7:10am. They took us right in and found that the rotors had been subject to heat stress and were warped. At least they found something! Now if I can just solve the electrical problem. On top of the 2 front rotors, we had to buy 2 new tires so we had a matched set on front. Off to the auto parts store for a proper-sized wrench to tighten the battery lugs. We also stopped at the vet’s to get more special dog food for Daisy. Finally, on to breakfast/lunch at 11:30am: great omelet for me, and poached eggs for Susie. Three more items to get before we headed north: gas we got, 1/2 & 1/2 unsuccessful and propane unsuccessful. Oh, well, off we went to the north with the Wind River Range to the east and the Wyoming and Commissary Ranges to the west. The Wind River Range was much more impressive with the snow line estimated to be 9,000 feet. The peaks are on the Continental Divide and top out around 13,800 feet. We stopped in the town of Pinedale and went into the USFS Fremont Lake Campground.
he Lake is at elevation 7,420 feet, and we are a bit above that. The water is clear and cold, but Daisy has been swimming twice, She was a wild woman. We camped among the aspen trees with dark clouds to the southwest.


June 17, 2009 Wednesday:
Susie said that it rained last night after I went to bed, and it was still raining intermittently in the morning when I got up to walk Daisy. We left the campsite 10:45am and noticed that everyone else had jumped into their cars or trucks and left, probably for town. The RV started without a problem, and off we went into town to buy milk and a few other minor things. When we tried to start the RV, it wouldn’t until I wiggled the battery cables. We went to the Library for internet services, and the RV had a bit of trouble starting but it made it. We were driving out of Pinedale and just about the last building was an auto repair facility. We turned around and asked for help. They were braver than I and really tightened the stud. I was told that the double cable setup we have is prone to loosening, and I will probably have the problem forever. Thanks GM! We drove north along WY191, joining WY189 towards Jackson WY. On the east side were the snow-capped mountains of the Wind River Range and on the west were the snow-capped mountains of the Wyoming Range.

The valley narrowed as we went north, and the views became more intense. We followed the Hogback River until it ended at the Snake River and turned north towards Jackson following the Snake River. The Hogback River was in a narrow and twisting valley. By then the snow-capped mountains had disappeared, but soon the Teton Range came into view with its snow-capped and cloud obscured peaks. We had lunch in a Chinese restaurant and talked them into giving us a small container of raw cashew nuts for Susie. We continued north through Jackson and went to the Gros Ventre Campground. This campground gets its name from the nearby river that at this time due to all the rain is flowing so full that they have half of the spaces closed. It’s not too long to the July 4th weekend so there are some who are wishing for sunny skies. We can see the Tetons from our campsite, and as I said before, the tops are snow-capped and partially obscured by the clouds. The rainsqualls keep coming and the humidity is the highest we have seen in a long time, maybe since the start of the trip. We made reservations to take a 10-mile raft trip down the Snake River on Friday. A special treat tonight: there is a family of great horned owls living in the Campground, and the NPS has taken the step of closing off the campsites nearby with yellow tape to protect the 2 young birds.
They are almost ready to fledge, and we hope to see that. As the sun set, the mother flew off to hunt. She came through the Campground at a height of about 20 feet off the ground. All the campers with small designer dogs should be careful!