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Pre-trip report
Let me start by saying that I love vacations. I look forward to them more than anything. And we had been planning this Moab Fall Trip for many months. So I should have been excited that it was almost here. Unfortunately events had been conspiring against me, and my mental state in the days before was not what it should have been because…

1. I was unprepared. I am the master of vacation planning, but it had been such a crazy few weeks. With Lily’s birthday and Brian being out of town, and meetings and school and everything else, I had not had any time to make plans and do the research I had intended. The only thing that saved us at all was that back one day in the summer when I was bored I had made some tentative plans, thinking I would come back and revise them with more info later. At the time I thought I was really planning too far in advance, but its lucky I did it then because I never got back to it. So I wasn’t really feeling ready.

2. It was a really bad weekend to be gone. Of course I couldn’t have known this when we made the reservations months ago, but we were missing several things – a soccer game, a birthday party, the Kindergarten transition ritual at church, and two days of school for Lily. The last one didn’t seem like a big deal until she started a new school three days before the trip… that wasn’t ideal for sure. I was wishing we had planned the trip for the next weekend instead. But what can you do.

3. I was sick. I had been battling a cold for almost 2 weeks, and actually suspected it might be a sinus infection. I should have gone to the doctor by now but with the crazy week that had come before there was just no way. Better sick on vacation than sick at home… but still. I was sick.

4. The weather forecast did not look good. Moab is in the desert, it hardly ever rains, but I did notice that October was supposed to be the rainiest month. Sure enough, the forecast called for sun all week (before we got there) and then rain all weekend. Great. I went ahead and rescheduled our evening boat cruise from Sunday to Monday because that was the only day that looked even remotely promising. Sitting in the tent watching it rain for three days wasn’t really what I had in mind when I booked this trip…

So I was hoping we could overcome all this and still have a good time…but the anticipation is fun too and I felt like I had missed out on that.

Chapter 1. Through the Glowing Mountains.

We got up early, just after 5am. We were hoping to be on the road by 6am, the rush was due mostly to the fact that I was hoping to make it to the Sorrell River Resort for lunch, which was just outside Moab. We got ready and rounded up a few last minute things and were on the road just a little after 6:00. We stopped in Castle Rock for some Chick-fil-a, one of the few places we can all agree on for breakfast. We took our food to go, and saw a “Barrel of Fun” (looked like some sort of carnival ride) on a truck in the parking lot! Lily thought that was pretty cool and wondered where it was going.

We headed on up north through Denver, missing the E-470 turnoff, so we went through downtown. And then on into the mountains to where all the ski resorts are. The Aspen’s had turned and were all glowing bright yellow. Many of the mountains through there are covered with them and it looked like the whole mountainside was glowing fluorescent yellow at times! It was simply beautiful, I took some pictures but they don’t really do it justice. Onward we went, through the tunnels, through the glowing aspens, through Glenwood Canyon (the most expensive span of interstate in the country), that road seems to go on forever. Finally we crossed the border into Utah, but it was still a while until the exit.

Once off the interstate, we found ourselves on a winding up and down road that meandered through the desert. I don’t usually find driving very fun, but that came pretty close! It was very different for sure. By now we were starting to drive through some canyons with steep red walls all around us. The clouds, rain and fog had moved in and made the whole place seem very eerie, but beautiful in its own way. Almost like it was haunted. We were starving though and glad to at last see the Sorrell Resort come into view… it was (past) time for lunch!

Chapter 2. The Tent that Caused all the Trouble 

There was still a light rain falling when we got out, so we all wrapped up in our rain jackets. The restaurant was on the upper level overlooking the resort grounds, and was almost empty since we were so late. I ordered a Tomato Caprisse sandwich, which I apparently mispronounced to the chagrin of the waitress. Brian got some sort of steak sandwich, and Lily played it safe with a grilled cheese. The food was pretty good – pricey but then again you are paying for the location and experience too.

During lunch the subject of the tent came up. Our big gray tent had mysteriously disappeared since our Albuquerque trip last year, and not wanting to be crowded into the backpacking tent for three days I had picked up a cheap 4 person tent at Target a few days before. Brian wasn’t very happy about this. I was hoping it would blow over…but it didn’t. Things continued to go downhill once back on the road…eventually we stopped next to the river just outside Moab and everyone managed to get themselves back together again.

Coming through Moab I tried to spot the various restaurants I had listed on my itinerary so many months ago… I had managed to print out a few maps at school the day before (since my printer at home was out of ink) but again I felt very unprepared. It looked like most stuff was somewhere along Main St though so it shouldn’t be too hard. The KOA campground was on the other side of town… Brian was a little disappointed that we weren’t camping more in the wilderness or closer to the river, but its so much harder to find those places online and get reservations when you don’t know where stuff is. Fortunately the rain had slowed by now to a very slight drizzle, hopefully we could get the tent set up without everything getting soaked.
We checked in at the office and drove over to our campsite – we had as usual requested a remote site, they were indeed a little farther from the RVs but very close to the other tent sites. Lucky for us, I guess, we were the only tent there. Were we crazy to be camping in this weather or what???

Getting the new tent set up took a little while, since we had to figure out how it worked first. Lily played on the playground across from our camp site while we worked. We finally got it together though, and spent some time relaxing inside. Lily was hyper, and bounced all around the tent dancing, singing, climbing on us… this is a camping kid for sure. For a while we were talking about names, and Lily wanted to guess Florida Grandma and Grandpa’s names… we gave her a hint about the first letter, her first guesses were “Kanet and Damet”. We got a pretty good laugh out of that… I don’t think she had heard either of the expressions that those words sound like, she just thought they were reasonable guesses! Around 6pm we decided to venture out to find dinner.

 

Chapter 3. To Town and Back Again

We drove back into town, I had a few options in mind for eating and was again trying to spot familiar things as we drove down Main St. When on vacation I have a rule about not eating at any place we could eat at when home, so I am always looking for local joints, preferably that offer some unusual atmosphere when possible. I had looked up what I could about Moab dining, and Eddie McStiff’s Restaurant had come up several times. We found it pretty easily and there wasn’t even a wait. I had a yummy strawberry smoothie and some pasta, Brian got a Prime Rib, and Lily had mini-corn-dogs. We were pretty tired by the time we headed back and were soon ready to snuggle down for the night in the tent. We must have been asleep pretty quickly, I know I at least slept very soundly, more so than I usually do when camping.

In the morning Lily was ready to get going a little before we were, finally we all rolled ourselves out of our sleeping bags around 7am and got ready to head out for the day. Lily was amazing us with her reading ability by reading all the signs she saw around the campground…she has really been doing well.

Once in town we spotted the Pancake Haus, there was a large tour group standing outside but decided to go in anyway and see if we could get in without much wait. Fortunately they seated us right away. I got the banana walnut pancakes. I hadn’t been paying much attention to what Lily was eating until she suddenly announced to look at her plate – she had eaten it clean! On giant pancake, two pieces of bacon and a large pile of eggs! After breakfast we found the grocery store and stocked up for our picnic lunch with some snacks and Uncrustables (frozen peanut butter and jelly sandwiches). Our destination for the day was Canyonlands National Park, which was a bit of a drive still from Moab. But at last we were on the way, hopefully the weather would hold out!

Chapter 4. Canyonlands

The drive towards Canyonlands was very scenic, more of the red rock cliffs and unique formations. We entered the National Forest area first and stopped at the Monument and Merrimac Lookout point. Monument and Merrimac are two huge mesas. Lily had fun running and jumping on all the rocks. We soon moved on and headed on into the park. We bought a new National Parks Pass since ours had expired in August. We should get quite a bit of use out of this year’s pass with our planned travels… and its always nice to support the National Parks even if we don’t end up getting our money’s worth.

Canyonlands National Park is actually divided into two sections, “Island in the Sky” and The Needles”. The two areas are not reachable from each other, unless you take the highway around the park through Moab. It looks like it would be about a 2-3 hour trip around, so you pretty much have to pick one part and stick with it. We had chosen “Island in the Sky” which is the northern part. The two halves are not connected due to the vast canyons and river in between.
Canyonlands reminded us a lot of the Grand Canyon, and I am surprised that it is not as popular or well-known. It could definitely put up some good competition with the world-famous park in terms of size and beauty. The canyons go on as far as the eye can see, in every direction! It is simply beyond words.

We started our adventure by driving to the far end of Island in the Sky, to Grand View Point. There was an overlook area, and a trail that headed off from there. It wasn’t a long trail but was very cool, hiking along the rim of the canyon and over lots of rocks, which Lily liked, of course! The weather was holding up decent enough so far, very overcast but no rain in our immediate area. We could see it coming down in the distance though and hoped it stayed away. When we first started the hike it was rather cool, but by the end the sun had come out some more and we were all peeling off our sweatshirts. Once back at the trailhead we were hungry for lunch, so we drove back to the White Rim picnic area which was just up the road.

There were several picnic tables, each with a parking spot right next to them. Unfortunately all the parking spaces next to tables were taken, though several of the tables themselves were empty. We weren’t sure if the people parked there were planning to come back and use it, but we went ahead and set up at one of the empty ones. About that time the guy in the car that was parked there came back, and he assured us we could use the table, later though we saw him eating his car and felt bad that we had taken his table. Oh well.

Lunch was yummy, after we had our fill we headed out to the trail. Lily was pretending to be a rocket and was taking me on a journey through the solar system. We would stop at various planets to look around sometimes. We all stopped for a little while and sat down on the rim of an amazing overlook into the vast canyons below… it was very humbling. And also very quiet, when we stopped talking we could almost hear our own heartbeats in the peaceful silence!

We moved on and finished the trail, then headed back north to see the rest of Island in the Sky. Lily fell asleep for a few minutes, but woke up when we got to Whale Rock. It really does look like a whale. There was a short trail that went up to the top, and Lily took another pb&j sandwich to eat on the go. Walking along the top was pretty cool, we were definitely in one of the highest spots around. There were also several big puddles of water in low spots on the rock from the rain the day before, and since we were running low on water we took the opportunity to filter some for the water bottle. Canyonlands National Park has no drinking water available anywhere, so you have to come prepared. And there was very little access to natural water sources so this was a good chance to stock up.

Back from that adventure, we continued on the Upheaval Dome. Lily and I decided to sit this one out, but Brian took the trail and said it was really cool. Finally time to head back into town, we drove out of the park and back towards Moab to find dinner… I still think this place is one of the best kept secrets of the West, anyone appreciates the Grand Canyon would be blown away by Canyonlands!

Chapter 5. We couldn’t escape the rain ALL day…

Heading out of the park we decided that Italian sounded good for dinner, I had spotted a place called Cabano’s on the northern edge of town so we went there. We sat upstairs by the window, it was a very relaxing end to our fun but exhausting day. Since Lily had done a good job hiking, I had told her earlier in the day we would get some ice cream for dessert. The restaurant was right on Main Street, and I figured a walk down the tourist section of town was bound to lead to an ice cream shop at some point. We noticed as we were leaving that there was rain not far away, and I briefly thought about bringing the rain coats… that would have been a really swell idea. But I didn’t. I did get some nice pictures of the beautiful sunset though.

We did pass a couple of ice cream places, but they were closed. I guess the season for that has pretty much ended. We hadn’t given up yet, but suddenly I started feeling rain drops. And then got a little panicky when I realized that we were all wearing our only sweatshirts, and the only thing that was going to keep us warm in the tent that night! Except that they wouldn’t keep us very warm if they were wet! So we ran as fast as we could back to the car. We were a bit wet, but not totally drenched anyway. The ice cream would have to wait for another night…we ate some oreos left over from lunch instead. Back at the campground we got ready for bed and settled in for the night. I was very glad I had rescheduled our boat tour which had initially been for this evening, the weather would not have cooperated for sure! Hopefully tomorrow we would have more luck…

Chapter 6. Arches 

I didn’t sleep quite as well that night for some reason, I remember waking up several times and having a hard time getting back to sleep. I was still sick, that combined with being a little bit cold made for a less pleasant night than the one before. But we managed to get ourselves going not long after 7am, again Lily was bouncing around the tent long before I wanted to get up.

We drove back into town for breakfast at the Jailhouse Café. It is in a building that used to serve as the courthouse for the county back around the turn of the century, apparently the restaurant office is in what used to be the jail cell, hence the name. The breakfast was pretty good, though a little pricey I thought. After eating, we stopped for gas, and then decided to swing by the grocery store for more Uncrustables and Gatorade, we still had enough of everything else left-over from the day before. We were headed to Arches National Park, which isn’t so far out of town, but due to its size we decided it would still be a pain to have to come back into Moab for lunch, another picnic would be nice anyway. With everything we needed finally gathered up, we headed for the park.

We sailed right through the entrance with our new annual pass, but almost immediately hit a huge traffic jam. That was unexpected. The cars were lined up at a dead stop as far as the eye could see. People were getting out and walking along the road to see what was going on, but no one could make much out for a while. Finally we realized it was due to some construction, they had closed one lane and were using the flagman technique to trade off which direction could go at a time. But it was a very long stretch of road that was affected so we were waiting at least 20 minutes or more. Finally we got to go, and I snapped a few cool shots as we drove.

We passed Balanced Rock and hopped out for a few minutes to take a stroll on the short path around it, it looks like a giant anvil ready to come crashing down… hope it really is as “balanced” as the name implies…

Again we started our adventure by driving all the way to the far end of the park, which was at Devil’s Garden. There were several arches along this trail so I figured it was a good way to start. We came to Landscape Arch pretty quickly. The trail used to go under the arch, but after a section of the arch collapsed in the 1990s they decided it was too unstable so now the trail ends at a good viewing spot, but you can’t go all the way up to it. The geology of these sandstone arches is very complicated, but has to do with the underlying salt bed, and the forces of erosion on the rock layers as they have shifted and collapsed above the fragile salt deposits. From there the trail continued to the Double-O Arch, which we could see in the distance. Lily really wanted to go to that one since you could climb up inside it, but it was up on the cliff face a bit and I thought at least one part of the trail looked a bit treacherous to be taking her on. So we waited at the bottom while Brian went. It was a good chance for Lily to play in the sand and rock anyway, which was one of her favorite activities.

On the way back we took the side trails to Pine Tree and Tunnel Arch. Lily especially liked Pine Tree Arch, that was the first one we visited that she could go under and climb around inside. She is getting so daring at climbing on rocks, sometimes a little too daring for my comfort zone, but at least this one didn’t have any precarious drop-offs on the other side. Tunnel Arch was up high on the cliff wall so we could only view it from below, then it was time to head back and find a good spot for our picnic. I hadn’t been feeling at my best so far, between being sick, not having gotten a good night’s sleep, and being a little tired from our hikes before, it was all taking its toll. So I was hoping lunch would rejuvenate me a bit.

Chapter 7. Lily the Rock Climber

There was a picnic area at Devil’s Garden, but we could tell even at a distance that it was packed, so we went back to Balanced Rock where the map indicated there was another picnic spot. It was on the other side of the road, and to our great luck was almost empty! Why everyone was crowding into the Devil’s Garden one I do not know, but we quickly grabbed what I thought was the best spot there, right near the edge of the cliff overlooking the canyon, and with lots of shade! Lunch was very refreshing, more yummy picnic food and the weather was just perfect. Plus, you couldn’t beat the view. I felt so much better after lunch, hopefully I could enjoy our afternoon hikes more than I had the morning ones.

After lunch we drove over to the “Windows” section of the park. The North Window was the first arch on the trail, this was one of Lily’s favorites. The arch itself started from the ground, but went up just steep enough to make me a little uncomfortable with her climbing up it. Of course she did it anyway. At one point I remember thinking as we were scaling the side back down that we were absolutely nuts. This would turn out to just be a warm up though. There was a really nice view out the other side of the arch from where we climbed too though. Once safely down we continued on to the South Window. From there a primitive trail leads in a long loop back to the parking lot. Brian wanted to take it, but Lily suddenly desperately needed to go potty. So I took her back to the trailhead the way we had come, and Brian continued on to finish the longer loop.

We had only been back from the potty a few minutes when Brian got back, he makes such better time when we aren’t tagging along. There was one more arch in this section, the Double Arch. It was on a very short trail, in fact we could see it from the parking lot but wanted to get closer, since this was another one that you could go up inside.

Remember that our earlier arch climbing adventure was just a warm-up… this one was named Double Arch because there are two arches that kind of make a V with each other, its hard to describe so you’ll have to see the picture. Anyway, to get up into the second arch you have to scale a very steep and rather tall wall…I absolutely cannot believe we did this. Actually Brian and Lily did it, I never went all the way up. Mostly because I couldn’t even keep up, that girl was up the rock before I could even warn her to stop! Brian was just trying to stay close enough to catch her if she fell, even that was sometimes hard. Going up isn’t so hard, its always coming down that is a bit precarious. We were struggling to get Lily down, and I was thinking how crazy we were to have gotten ourselves into this predicament. Fortunately a nice man who was about half way up offered to help, he was in a better position to grab Lily and lifted her on down to the ground. I’m sure we would have made it anyway (or at least I’d like to be)… but I’m still not sure that was a smart thing to do and was very grateful for the help. Lily on the other hand, was beaming at her accomplishment and didn’t understand why we weren’t so thrilled about what we had just done. She says she is going to climb Mt Everest one day (or Mountain Everest as she calls it) and I am starting to believe her… this girls’ got rock climbing in her blood!

We had mentioned several times during the day how this place reminded us a lot of Garden of the Gods, only MUCH bigger and MUCh more dramatic. It was now getting close to time to head back for our dinner and boat cruise, we stopped at a few places to take pictures along the way, and Brian did one more hike, it was a one way hike where I could pick him up at the other end so it worked out well, especially since Lily was asleep by now. After he was done, we headed out of the park and back into town. It was a tad bit early still but there wasn’t time to do anything else, so we were off to our evening on the river!

Chapter 8. Canyonlands by Night

We checked in at Canyonlands By Night and picked up our tickets. We had a little while until diner so we wandered around by the fountains and looked out onto the river. I also bought a t-shirt for myself, and aa zippered hoodie for Lily. We were soon seated for dinner and the lead tour guide, Dee (who totally looked like an old cowboy), gave us a brief synopsis of how dinner and the cruise would proceed. It was a Dutch Oven Dinner of several types of barbequed meat and some really tasty sides. When we were almost done, one of the servers brought Lily an apple that had been sliced to look like a duck! That was pretty neat, as Lily was the only kid on the whole tour that evening. Finally it was time to board the boat. Cameras are not allowed on the night cruise, so I snapped one last shot of Lily once we got settled then put the camera away. I had bought a pack of pictures from the gift shop since I couldn’t take my own.

Dee started us off down the river, explaining a lot about the area’s climate and geology. He was a really fun tour guide, and pointed out lots of spots on the canyon walls where it’s easy to see a “face” or other shape. Once down the river a ways, it had finally gotten dark enough for the show to begin.

The road we had come into town on runs right beside the river, and they have a “light truck” that drives along the road lighting up the canyon walls for the show. The narration told about the history of the area in the form of stories, some real and some more legendary. The light work was amazing. They create these moving shadows on the walls that, if you use your imagination just a little, look a lot like what is happening in the story. It is easy to see men riding on horses through the desert, or wild animals running across the plains. But it’s very abstract, makes it a little eerie and cool. And the music soundtrack was perfect, made the atmosphere feel very authentic and complete. A few times during the show they turned out all the lights so we could admire the night sky – it was totally clear and the stars were beautiful. I could even see the Milky Way, can’t even remember the last time I saw that, at least not this clear. I was thinking that this was definitely the highlight of the whole trip, the whole canyon had seemed to come alive with the history and beauty of the night. But finally the story and the cruise were coming to an end and we were docked back at Canyonlands by Night. After we got off they had free hot chocolate. It had been a very special evening indeed.

We drove back to the campground, this was the latest we had been out on our trip, so we were all tired by the time we got back. Lily and I decided to sleep underneath one of the blankets we had been using as padding, that would definitely make for a warmer night. It had been an unforgettable day for sure, tomorrow we have to head home.


Chapter 9. A History Lesson, then Home

We slept in a bit the next morning, finally got up around 8am and went to get breakfast before packing up. We had noticed a Chinese restaurant in town that advertised a Breakfast Buffet so we went there. It was pretty tasty, mostly typical American breakfast stuff but some Chinese food as well. Lily especially liked the shrimp and lo-mien noodles. Yes, that was for breakfast. But we had eggs and pancakes too.

After breakfast it was time to pack up camp. As usual it took a while to get everything back into the car. The tent was especially hard – I have no idea how it fit so easily into that tent bag the first time, I didn’t think there was any way it was going back in! We finally got it, but the poor tent bag looks like it is ready to burst at any moment. Lily played again on the playground while we packed up, she was having a blast.

Finally we were ready to check-out. We drove back into town for one last destination, the Moab Museum. It was small, but really neat. Had lots of historic stuff, including many native American artifacts that date back to over 1000 years ago, as well as some more recent exhibits having to do with the towns mining and cowboy days. There were a few geological pieces too, showing dinosaur fossils and the changes that have taken place in the area over the millennia. We had the place to ourselves, and the elderly lady who worked there commented on how observant Lily was for a 5 year old!

After we were done there we went to the nearby Pantele’s Desert Deli for lunch before hitting the road. Lily was asleep before we even made it out of town. We drove back on the highway we came in on, even though it is a little longer it is much more scenic, and since it was raining on the way in we didn’t get a very good look at it before. I was spectacular, of course. Eventually we made it to the interstate, and despite the temptation to head elsewhere for another adventure, we got back on it. Coming through Glenwood Canyon from this direction it was easy to see why it is such an impressive feat – almost 16 miles of raised interstate! The westbound lanes are suspended up above the eastbound lanes, and all of it is perched the side of the narrow canyon. As we came through Denver we stopped at Red Robin for dinner, then homeward bound. It would be too late once we got into town to pick up Nala from the PetsHotel, so she would have to enjoy one more night there.

We have already decided that we would like to come back to Moab next fall, we found a nice camping area right along the river that would be a big improvement over the parking lot that is KOA, and there were several areas in both of the parks that we didn’t get to see. We had planned on going to Chicago next fall break, but now that I think about it, there’s no reason why we have to go there in the fall. Since Fall seems to be a great time in the desert, maybe spring would make a better setting for the city…