Arches National Park, Canyonlands National Park & Moab, Utah

Visited May 3 - 9, 2021

By Janell

 

We love finding these “postcard” murals. Of course, some are better than others. Marty found this one, and as you can see it’s one of the better ones. Then Marty learned that it was created by a company called Greetings Tour. We were very impressed with their process and the end result. We’ve seen one other postcard mural that this company has done: New Orleans. If you look back at our New Orleans post you’ll see the similarities between it and this one.

Here’s a bit about Greetings Tour from their website: 

Greetings Tour creates landmarks through public art. Using the classic large letter postcard style, they work with communities to create colorful murals featuring local landmarks, history and culture. 

Muralist Victor Ving and photographer Lisa Beggs have been traveling out of their RV since leaving NYC in 2015. They lived full time on the road for 5 years and chose Southern California as a home base.

The artist duo has completed over 45 murals in 21 states, continuing their mission to paint in all 50 states across America.

If you want to find out more about them: 

Greetings Tour murals

 

 

 

We started off our Moab stay with our second Covid vaccine shot (Yay!) 

 

AND

 

A visit from “Fix My RV Guy” - whose name is . . . Guy. 

 

Our water heater had been making a whiny, water rushing sound for the last couple of weeks. Marty talked with the Tiffin company, and it sounded like it was the “check valve” – anyway, not something that was going to leave us without hot water one morning, so we waited till Moab to line up the repair.

Guy from “Fix My RV Guy” was actually staying in our same RV park. How’s that for convenience? He showed up at 8:00am and got right to work. He pulled the unit to replace the check valve, but look at what else he found:

Compare a brand new anode with our completely corroded one

 

3+ hours later the job is done! Or so we thought …

Marty left the panel door (inside our rig) open so that the area could dry and so he could check on it. Later that night he found that it was leaking. Aaarrgghh! Good thing Marty checked! Otherwise who knows how long it would’ve leaked before we realized it.

Marty texted with Guy’s wife, and she said Guy would come see us at 7:00am the next day. I filled a few vessels with water for us to use, and then Marty turned off the water heater and the water.

The next morning at 6:45 we could hear Guy outside beginning to look at the water heater.

A water heater in a motorhome is not as easily accessible as one in your home. Midway through the morning Guy told Marty "this is officially the job from hell”. (For the record, it wasn't any fun for us either.) Marty also overheard Guy talking to himself: “this is a freakin’ nightmare”. I think these "accolades" are due to the tight quarters surrounding the water heater.

This is our 10-gallon water heater pulled out and propped on a box and a table so that Guy could work on it

3+ hours later the job is done! Or so we thought …

Our water heater is propane and electric. Usually we have the gas part turned off unless we need an extra amount of hot water, such as for back-to-back showers. Then we use both gas and electric, as was recommended when we bought the Beast.

After Guy left, Marty tested the gas heater and it didn’t work. Marty texted Guy again and arranged for him to come out the next morning at 7:00 again. This time though, we felt we knew Guy well enough to give him a key to the Beast. We couldn’t sit around twiddling our thumbs for yet another day – we had things to see! And in the meantime at least we had the electric going for us.

We returned from our day’s adventure, and the gas heater was working. Yay! But, now the electric wasn’t working. You have got to be kidding! Are we on candid camera, or what?! Marty wrestled with whether to even tell Guy. We really didn’t want him pulling the water heater out for a fourth time. In the end, Marty decided to mention it to Guy, and if it was something easy that he could do without pulling the water heater, then yes, do it. If not, then never mind. We could live with just the gas until we got to a bigger city. 

Turned out that Guy had just forgotten to turn the electric back on.

Ah, life on the road … 😁

 

 

 

Our first Moab adventure was in Arches National Park: the Devil's Garden Trail. It was eight miles, took us five hours (with many stops, of course), and showed us eight arches. It was definitely amazing, but my anxiety over a few parts of it kept me from fully enjoying it. I was clearly in over my head on this hike!

Well, the NPS posted warning did state "scrambling and climbing on uneven surfaces and near cliff edges". Seriously, what was I doing on this trail?! In my trail guide's defense (that's Marty, you know), Alltrails.com did not make the description sound so intimidating. In my opinion however, NPS had a more accurate description of the trail.

Tunnel Arch

Pine Tree Arch

These are fins - remember that for later

Uh-huh

 

 Here comes my first obstacle. And I do mean a literal OBSTACLE!

 

"but it's really grippy", he said

This stuff is actually very grippy, even though it's called "slickrock". The name "slickrock" was used by early settlers of the area to describe the sandstone because of the low traction between horses' metal shoes and the rock's sloping surfaces. The same is true for cyclists who use shoes with metal cleats while riding the Slickrock Trail. Slickrock also becomes slick when wet. (Gives me shivers just thinking of it!)

Taking a much-needed breather before I crab-walk my way down this bugger

 

This was my other option (instead of up and over), but it didn't look very appealing either

A young woman ahead of us chose this muddy puddle option instead, saying she had a fear of heights. She had hoped to walk on the edge of the puddle and not get her feet wet. Didn't work. Both feet were in over her ankles before she was done. My luck, I might've ended up on my butt in the puddle. But even if it was just the feet, wet footwear for the next six or so miles wasn't a good option either.

I guess I would say that my fear of potentially bacteria-filled mud puddles trumped my fear of heights. However, even as high up on that rock as I was, I envisioned sliding off into this puddle that waited at the bottom. Ugh. 

Desert Paintbrush

 

My second intimidating obstacle was not nearly as high or as steep, but just getting up on top of it was a stretch for me (literally). Marty had gone up and was looking for the easiest route for me to take. There was a stepping rock to put one foot, but I had no idea how to get my other foot (and body) up on top. If only there were hand holds. Marty suggested that maybe I could back up a bit and take a running jump at it. I told him I didn't think I was the "running jump at it" kind of girl.

A young couple came from the opposite direction and dropped down off of the rock I was agonizing over. The man was so very nice - he offered that I could step on his knee, while he was on the stepping rock, and thus give me a little more height. I asked him twice if he was sure, and then I took him up on his offer! What an angel he was! (Sorry, we have no pictures of this obstacle and/or solution.)

Double O Arch

Here comes obstacle #3. This one was more of a mental issue than a physical one. I saw the sign that read "Trail Crosses Arch Fin" and thought, you have to be kidding me. I mean, I saw people up there, but I just assumed they were off-trail adventure-seekers. They couldn't really mean that the official trail goes up on top of that fin?! They meant it.

On top of a fin!

I told myself to just look at each step you take, and don't look over the edge!

Like Swiss cheese

Partition Arch (half of it anyway)

We both agreed that this was our favorite arch. We had no idea of what to expect, and then we came around the corner to find an arch with a view! The other half is a smaller opening on the right side of the "partition". The whole thing was too big to do it justice in one photo.

Obstacle #4 was similar to the last fin walk. I think this one might've been narrower on top but less of a dramatic drop off than the previous fin. This poor woman was having trouble getting up to it; meanwhile there was a back-up of people waiting to go both directions. We were going down, but after this woman we had to wait for about ten more people to come up and pass us before we could proceed down.

I didn't want to be a party pooper, so I didn't tell her that it doesn't get any easier where she's headed!

Landscape Arch, one of the longest arches in the world.

 

MOAB STUFF:

 

If only he could talk

 

Moab seems to be all about these things - the place is crawling with them! Apparently they even drive over the slickrock. (remember, it's grippy)

 

One evening we went to see this bluegrass band: "Quicksand Soup"

In Canyonlands National Park we did a couple of smaller hikes.

Mesa Arch on the Mesa Arch Trail

Lupines

These next four shots are from the Grand View Point Trail in Canyonlands NP:

That's the La Sal mountain range in the distance

 

 

Very near Canyonlands NP is Dead Horse Point State Park:

overlooking the Colorado River

The Legend of Dead Horse Point - from the Utah State Parks website:

Dead Horse Point is a peninsula of rock atop sheer sandstone cliffs. The peninsula is connected to the mesa by a narrow strip of land called the neck. There are many stories about how this high promontory of land received its name.

According to one legend, around the turn of the century, the point was used as a corral for wild mustangs roaming the mesa top. Cowboys rounded up these horses, herded them across the narrow neck of land and onto the point. The neck, which is only 30-yards-wide, was then fenced off with branches and brush. This created a natural corral surrounded by precipitous cliffs straight down on all sides, affording no escape. Cowboys then chose the horses they wanted and let the culls or broomtails go free. One time, for some unknown reason, horses were left corralled on the waterless point where they died of thirst within view of the Colorado River, 2,000 feet below.

Back at Arches National Park

FYI: The NPS entrance fee to each of the national parks is $30 per car/per day, however if you're 62 or over (and one of us is) you can purchase a lifetime senior pass for only $80 (or an annual senior pass for $20) What an amazing deal the lifetime pass is - we guard it like gold, as it's not replaceable. (For those of you not yet 62, an annual pass is $80.)

We went into Arches NP on three separate days. It really was an amazing park. This time we hiked up to Delicate Arch: the iconic arch you see on Utah license plates.

Most of the hike was on slickrock with steep ups and downs, but they weren't too "scary" as they were super wide rocks. They weren't so steep that one needed to "crab-walk" - walking upright was just fine.

This stretch right before we got to Delicate Arch was narrow and scary, but fortunately there wasn't too much of it.

Delicate Arch

You can see the people on the left lining up to get their photo shoots. We didn't do that. Marty went down there to take photos, but I was content to see it from this distance.

From this angle you can really see why they call it Delicate Arch

This is the "bowl" beside Delicate Arch. Some people did go down into it, and apparently sometimes people fall into it.

Other scenes from Arches National Park

Balanced Rock

The Courthouse Towers at dusk

Three Gossips

An artist does a beautiful rendition of Double Arch

MORE MOAB STUFF:

 

Marty met our neighbor, George. George is a very sweet 170 lb. Great Dane who likes to lean on people

We got Mother's Day lunch at Milt's, a Moab tradition since 1954. It's a few blocks off of the main drag, but as you can see business is good.

Every now and then we'll watch a movie that ties into a specific part of the country where we happen to be. We've watched A Streetcar Named Desire while in New Orleans, Key Largo in the Florida Keys, and Urban Cowboy in Texas, to name a few. Here are a couple of screen shots of our latest movie.

Any guesses?

Thelma and Louise

The final scene of the film where the ladies hit the gas on the Thunderbird and fly off the cliff into the Grand Canyon wasn't actually filmed in Arizona. Ridley Scott opted instead to shoot it in Utah at Dead Horse Point State Park.

That scene wrapped up the movie, and this wraps up my post.