June 7-9 My family and I went to Maob Utah for a vacation before I leave. It was a quick small vacation, but a needed one.
We left thursday evening around 8 and drove our rental car (A nice 2006 Chevy SUV) to Moab. We stopped at one rest stop on the way, and five long cramped leg hours later we were in Moab. We stayed in a Hotel that the travel agency at my dad's work got us a discount at. Very nice place. My parents were in one room, the boys in the second, and us three girls in the third. We finally unpacked and made it to bed around 2am. All tired and exhausted from driving such a long way.
This is a short clip of a hand dryer in a gas stations along the way. It was SO loud and rediculously powerful, it almost blows your skin off. Makes for a cool movie though!!!
Rachel and the camera she inherited from meFriday morning we woke up nice and early (7-8am) to get our free breakfast the hotel provides for all tenants. Lots of Sausage, waffles, yogurt, muffins, bagels, cereal, ........you name it, they had it. We stuffed ourselves silly , got dressed in our hiking clothes and shoes and piled in the SUV to go see some arches!!!!
My dad decided to go to the farthest part of the park and work our way back. Kind of like skimming through a magazine before reading it. I wish we had done it the other way around though. we drove past all the sites, wanting to take pictures, and by the time we were on our way back we were sick of all the red rock and wanted to go sleep. Oh well, it all worked out in the end.
Rachel didn't want to leave the dogs tp go to Moab. Me? EXCITED!!!
Me in a dead tree
See my creation? beautiful ain't it?
Looks like three guys having a council
Close up. Yikes
I thought this rock looked like a man's face....
Don't ask me, I have no clue what she was doing in this picture.
On the way to Delicate arch
Michelle & Lema
The warning
And the result of not heeding it.
Yumm, ROCKS!!!! Here is a quick video of Rachel detroying the rocks and the scenery around us.
This was the sunset at Subway at the end of the day. Looked better in person
Michelle & Lema again
Our happy little car
The valley right as you go up the mountain
Anyway, our first stop was the area of pine tree arch. I guess they call it that because there are tons of oine trees around it. Really weird because it's in the middle of the desert. We saw a smaller arch on the hike down and got some pics of that too. Pine tree arch is quite large and you can walk right under it. we stopped and rested in the shade for a while and got a bunch of pictures
After that we made out way to the landscape arch. this one had a bit longer hike to it, but worth it just the same.
On the way back from the landscape arch, their was a group of people just staring at the ground and taking video, so we stopped to see what was going on. This little(actually large) lizard was digging a hole for a home or something. Really cool to watch. Sorry for the shaky video, I was being attacked by bugs. Kind of reminded me of antelope island, but not that bad.
Finally it was time to see the famous delicate arch. you know, the one on all the postcards? We had to hike up this monsterous hill (reminded me of rocky ridge from the pioneer trek) that almost killed us all. I just had to tell myself to keep going, keep going, you can do it. all the while hoping someone on the trail had an inhaler or knew how to do CPR. We finally made it to the top and took a breather. Turns out we had about another mile to go, all up hill. Thank goodness it was in the 80's that day. The next day it was in the high 90's. Then I really would have died.
This was the sunset at Subway at the end of the day. Looked better in person
Michelle & Lema again
Our happy little car
The valley right as you go up the mountainAnyway, our first stop was the area of pine tree arch. I guess they call it that because there are tons of oine trees around it. Really weird because it's in the middle of the desert. We saw a smaller arch on the hike down and got some pics of that too. Pine tree arch is quite large and you can walk right under it. we stopped and rested in the shade for a while and got a bunch of pictures
After that we made out way to the landscape arch. this one had a bit longer hike to it, but worth it just the same.
On the way back from the landscape arch, their was a group of people just staring at the ground and taking video, so we stopped to see what was going on. This little(actually large) lizard was digging a hole for a home or something. Really cool to watch. Sorry for the shaky video, I was being attacked by bugs. Kind of reminded me of antelope island, but not that bad.
Finally it was time to see the famous delicate arch. you know, the one on all the postcards? We had to hike up this monsterous hill (reminded me of rocky ridge from the pioneer trek) that almost killed us all. I just had to tell myself to keep going, keep going, you can do it. all the while hoping someone on the trail had an inhaler or knew how to do CPR. We finally made it to the top and took a breather. Turns out we had about another mile to go, all up hill. Thank goodness it was in the 80's that day. The next day it was in the high 90's. Then I really would have died.
the Devil hill we had to hike (WAY steeper than it looks)
Rachel dying from the hike
Michael Dying from the Hikeanyway, we finally made it to delicate arch and got some great pictures. Although you have to walk acroos this steep side of a cliff practically and if you fall it will be to your death, but worth it for a picture under the arch right???.
The steep cliff you have to walk across. Looks like form Star Wars, No??
Delicate Arch
Me and Rachel under Delicate ArchAmazingly my mom and dad made it up the hill too (about 30 minutes after we did)
Everyone had blisters and sunburns after the hike to delicate arch and we were all starved, dehydrated and ready to go home. We piled in the SUV and headed for the hills.
We stopped at Subway for some dinner, at amazingly fast, went back to the hotel and crashed for the night. I didn't even change my clothes, I hit the pillow and was out.
The next morning we were all pretty sore and groggy, but woke up bright and early for the free breakfast. We were still hungry from the night before as we proabably burned 2000 calories on just the last hike. Once we were all nicely fed, we hopped in the car and went to see the last of the arches.
We came upon balance rock (it think that's what it's called) and had to get out and take pictures. though none of us could walk more than 3 feet without collapsing from the day before, we still got a lot of pictures.
Rachel would if she could
Look! I'm holding it!!!!
We ended our trip with a quick lunch at McD's and went off to search for some souvenir shops. We found called "The T-shirt Shop" that has tons of blank shirts and walls covered in designs of what to put on them. we all picked one out, and while we were waiting for the pictures to be screnned on the shirts, we found some awsome sunglasses and goofed off a bit. Rachel and I even found a squishing penny machine that puts a print of the arch on the penny (we collect the squished penny's from every where we go) so we had to get one of those!!!
My hand was backwards, I'm such a dork
We decided to take one last site seeing to Dead Horse Point. Its on the top of a mountain you drive up that has THE most spectacular views I've ever seen. The red rock in layers and layers as far as the eye can see. It looked like a painting. truly amazing.
Here is a panoramic view/video Then came time to leave. We were sad to go, but happy to be done hiking in the hot desert. moab is a fun beautiful place to visit, but too small of a town for me to ever want to live there. So we made it home safely and nursed our wounds healed and had a great vacation!!!!
FYI, I have about 150+ more pictures from this trip, all worth checking out. They are all in My Photo Album (link on the right at top) Go see!!!! (All these were taken with my new Sony 7.2 Megapix camera. It's sweet!!! I have video from this trip as well, will try and get it on here if I can figure it out!!!) UPDATE: We have videoo!!!!(as you have probably noticed. This started as a draft about a week ago, so now we have video even though it's all new to you guys!!!)
Over and out-Bec
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