Monday, May 18, 2009

Vacation

The mister and I took a trip to Moab, Utah.

Our first night led us to a cheap hotel in Omaha, Nebraska. It was pouring rain and about 9:00 at night, so we decided against camping and instead stayed someplace warm and dry.

The next day, after getting through Denver, we pitched our tent in Glenwood Springs, Colorado, which is about the cutest town ever. It was beautiful. It snowed.

Glenwood Springs CO2

Glenwood Springs CO5

From Glenwood Springs we made the short drive to Fruita, Colorado, a little place in the middle of nowhere with great mountain biking. The mister mountain biked. I tooled around the campground and found nice spots to read a book. I went on a three-mile “beginner” mountain bike with the mister and nearly died. Their definition of “beginner” is not the same as mine, because the beginner trail had obstacles even the mister was a little scared of. I walked for about 2 miles of the 3 mile trail.

Fruita CO2

The state park we stayed in charged for showers. As in, if you want to be clean and smell nice, you must drop quarters into the shower like you would a vending machine. The sign on the wall stated that this was to encourage water conservation. I have two issues with this. (1) I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a campground shower, but they are not places one is inclined to linger. Much like the showers in a freshman dorm, campground showers are the kinds of places you wear flip flops and are very careful to keep any of your naked bits from coming in to contact with any surface other than your own towel. (2) This place ran the sprinklers for over an hour at night; how serious about water conservation can they be?

After Fruita we headed into Moab. I love Moab. Arches National Park is just outside the town and Canyonlands isn’t very far (though we never did make it there). It’s all red rock and sage bushes and spectacular scenery. It’s dusty, and very hot and dry there, but so beautiful.

We ended up camping up on BLM land because the state park campgrounds in the area were full. The campground was significantly more primitive, mostly just a 4-wheel drive trail hacked into the side of a plateau with a couple of clearings where you could pitch tents and the occassional picnic table. And the most disgusting pit toilet I’ve ever encountered. Seriously foul. Of course, when your campsite looks like this, the icky pit toilet gets balanced out.

Moab UT1

It also lacked showers, something I came to want desperately on our second day there, when the blowing sand had worked its way inside all of my clothing, and I was sweaty and dirty from hiking around in 90 degree heat. Luckily, we packed a portable camp shower. While not as good as the real deal, it works in a pinch. Unluckily, there was no tree high enough to hang it from, which meant I had the option of resting it on top of the truck and showering in my swimsuit in plain view of everyone else in the campground (oh, hell no) or taking it behind a bush and sort-of half-assing a shower using a Dixie cup.

We spent three nights in Moab, with the mister mountain biking in the mornings while I hiked and shot pictures, and then we’d spend the afternoons walking around Arches National Park.

Arches 28

Arches 12

Arches 19

Arches 17

Arches 24

We chowed at the Moab Brewery, which I strongly recommend, and I spent a couple hours on our last day poking around the little shops in town while the mister did some really serious riding, which resulted in a sprained ankle. The good thing is that this happened on our last day and he was able to rest while I drove the very long 19 hours home.

Moab UT3

More pics here.

2 comments:

MOLLY said...

I love your pictures! And I can't believe you drove 19 hours home - crazy girl!

Anonymous said...

AWESOME pictures - it sounds like you had a great time. You are much more daring than I... I love the outdoors, but I require a bed and a roof to sleep under.