*If I wasn’t already thoroughly impressed by Utah the arches for sure clinched it. One of my favorite states so far. I was thinking it was just going to be a lot of desert but it wasn’t it was a lot of different rock and clay and sandstone formations in all kinds of colors just beautiful. *
We headed to Arches National Park after breakfast, which was about 3 hours from our campsite. We arrived about 12 and after a bathroom stop and water bottle fill up at the gas station, we headed into the park. We headed to the Balanced Rock and then parked so we could explore “the Windows”. We changed into our gym shoes…we learned at the Grand Canyon that hiking in flipflops was not ideal. Beth lost her flipflop under the car because it was super windy but some nice dad in the car next door fetched it for us… he must have thought me crawling on the pavement trying to reach it with my umbrella was not effective. Now the basic idea behind Arches National Park is that there are these natural sandstone arches formed by erosion. *mostly wind erosion. The sand blowing against them at high winds deteriorates them after time. I say wind erosion because it was flipping windy out there and I kept crunching on sand the would blow in my moth or get stuck to my teeth. MMM grit*We had experienced the powerful Utah rain already so it was understandable. There is something amazing about this… and I suppose if you had some engineering background you could explain how the arch holds itself up. *like most arches its all about the keystone, but in this case I think its really the relentless swirling wind and god* But we just explored and climbed around. Lindsay was desperately trying to get into this big hole next to the Turret Arch but she couldn’t get all the way up there because it turned flat and she had no hand holds. *ah so mad. If I wasn’t so scared of heights I think I really could have done it oh and had a little more arm and upper body strength (note to self pump iron and loose some more weight all could be helpful in rock climbing endeavors). This hole was so great. I know I’m weird but it was so inviting a nice little place to tuck yourself in absorb nature and read a book or take a nap spend some time reflecting. I wanted to be in that hole and I got pretty far but my fear of heights was not ideal for having confidence to get myself up the rest of the way. I will go back and get up there!* Beth wanted to follow her but I told her no, so we explored on the ground. *yeah I am not ideal to have around either when you have a very curious kid wanting to follow you. But a girl after my own heart she is just as curious as me. After all most days I revert to a younger age or maybe just to wild eyed curious spirit of a child. Whatever I love being in touch with my inner everyone should try it especially B. She does and awful sid the sloth impression. It’s more Sylvester spitting impressioin not as charming with spit flying everywhere* We found a little cave to climb up into, but it smelled like a portapotty so we were convinced people have been peeing there. We were starving so we headed back to the car, but not before Lindsay and Beth hunted for lizards. They caught this collared lizard which had all sorts of bright colors on it.* once again I reiterate that any day that includes successful lizard catching is a good day and especially a bigger one like that. I mean I am the queen of catching lizards but they are usually only abour 3 inches from head to tail and I am quite good at it. One year when I was by carrie in Tucson I went to start family easter at a park and I had every last child following me around because I was catching lizards. I hadn’t intended to be the family babysitter I just wanted to catch lizards and suddenly a line of kids formed behind me. I caught a lizard and handed it off to one of the kids until all of them were holding lizards. Told you childlike curiousity. But this collared lizard was a boy yep I know those things. Impressed? I know me too. It’s the biggest lizard I have caught in the wild and he was opening his mouth at me so I opened mine at him, B got some pics. Awesome lizard I thanked him for his time and set him free. I believe in catch and release just like fishing, that is if you don’t intend on cooking them and eating them that day and even then I still feel bad. A big sap I kno, why I am not a vegetarian is a good question. Because meat is delicious simply said.* We got back in the car and I drove to the Delicate Arch while Lindsay made sandwiches for us. Beth and I jammed out to Justin Bieber and the Jonas Brothers… screaming and singing at the top of our lungs. When she chases lizards and spits, she’s like Lindsay, *for the record I did not teach her to spit! She did it the first day she was on the road with us and I was like she spits,she’s like me. COOL! Lol* but when she’s rapping Bieber, she’s definitely like me.*yes B can have that one that’s cool I like being able to carry a tune ooo burn jk love you B!*
We devoured our sandwiches and after taking a loop to the arch viewpoint, Lindsay said she wanted to hike up to it. We saw some people on an offroading trail, but the Vue doesn’t have 4 wheel drive so we couldn’t try it out. * bummer that would have been a blast right up my alley, stinken grocery getter as some very humourus boys of the worzalla family call it while trying to get a rise out of me. What they don’t realize is I find the constant picking on me entertaining it cracks me up actually* We got to the Delicate Arch trail and brought our water bottles. The trail was supposed 1.5 miles, but it was all up hill so it seemed so much longer. Beth was tired so we’d stop every so often to rest and drink her water. She finished her water, so I gave her mine. Lindsay ventured ahead of us…apparently too impatient to wait for us. * more of I’m not a skinny minney and not all that fit and kept going so that I wouldn’t loose momentum. If I stopped I wouldn’t have kept going. I thought there was a direct path to this arch so I figured they’d be fine. Right? Well no because I followed these two girls who apparently didn’t take the path and I got lost and wound up on the not arch side of a big ravine. When I finally found the path I got up into and arch overlooking delicate arch and heard my name being called. Beth and B were on one side and I was on the other.i didn’t have any intention of loosing them but I’m like a pack mule I have a larger load to carry and slow and steady gets you were you need to be* We followed her but she vanished from sight so we kept walking in the direction we thought she went. Beth cooled off in the puddles on the rock. The sun was very hot and the hike was strenuous. We finally reached the top, but found a cliff, so we hiked around, and finally located the Delicate Arch. Lindsay was nowhere in sight. This is why you don’t separate. We found a rock to sit on…. The arch was surrounded by this big hole that looked like we were walking inside a clay pot. Beth spotted Lindsay on the other side of the gorge. We shouted to her…and it sort of echoed across the big pot. All of our water was gone so I was getting hot and agitated, since I hadn’t really gotten any water since I’d given mine to Beth. Beth climbed up to this cave…a little explorer just like us. We finally found the trail, which we had apparently deviated from. We found Lindsay and I gave her a piece of my mind for separating from us and being impatient. I hadn’t hiked my butt all the way up there to see the side of the arch so we walked around and I hiked over to it so I could stand underneath it. It was amazing in its strange simplicity and yet complexity. Very hot and tired, we began our descent. By the time we made it all the way down the mountain (we had an epic view of the whole desert), we’d been hiking for about 3 hours. I swallowed a whole bottle of water within 2 minutes and set out for the park entrance.
We pointed ourselves in the direction of Colorado. It was about an hour and a half drive to the state line, so we forged ahead. We stopped to fill up at Papa Joe’s gas station… and then on the road. We stopped to take a picture at the state line and headed into the Colorado Mesas… big plateaus. The sun was going down, so the lighting on the plateaus was really cool. We drove for about an hour more…than I got off at the town of Rifle, Colorado. We had passed Parachute too, but there wasn’t any campsites. There had been signs for Rifle State Park and since there had been no other signs for camping, I figured this was our best bet for finding a place to camp. We headed north through the small town of Rifle and towards Rifle State Park… we made a right at the fork which pointed to camping…left at the fork would’ve led us to the Rifle Correctional Facility. Just what you want to be camping by. * and this is the girl who apparently lives by the phrase “stranger danger” and we are both afraid of creepers, I’d be way more comfortable with bears.* We drove for about 10 more miles (so far away from the correctional facility) and passed the Rifle Gap Lake. Beth has a habit of calling any body of water a lake…like a stream or a river or a pond… apparently puddles are lakes in Arizona. *And lakes flow to the sea who knew?* We found a spot to camp and Lindsay set up the tent while me and Beth paid the fee, went to the bathroom, and I made us sandwiches. We decided to sleep sideways so we could all fit in the tent on the airmattress. It was chilly, so we put on pants. And then it was time for bed. We were all exhausted from all the hiking, and I think I had a little bit of heatstroke because I had a pounding headache. * actually she is unaware of this but she was fully experiencing the effects of “no food=bad mood” but she will never admit to that. Just sayin’. Also I would like to add we are tent setter upper pros. I am really good at setting up a tent in the dark. With the exception of Alaska and parts of Canada we always arrive to the campsites in the dark. Because it was dark we obviously had no idea what our surroundings looked like we could only speculate based on sounds and dim lighting. So it left a cool air of mystery for the morning to see what we were surrounded by. Kind of a fun little surprise every morning. I dug it.*
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