Carol packed me a bag full of snacks with energy bars, nuts, M&Ms & Peaches, thank you soo much for that, it lastet for days!
After we took the photo (it's in the last post already) I had two more things to do before I left: Buying dried cranberries and calling a bar in Green River to ask about watching the quarterfinal of the Euro. The Cranberries were a snack I discovered back in Pennsylvania and like I'm putting them always right next to my camera in my front bag I'm always eating some when I take photos, they're just too good, and expensive! But anyway, when I'm cycling now through totally abandoned areas I probably won't get the chance to by some very often so that will be probably good for my budget:)
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| How my front bag looks like :) |
The bar I called in Green River assured me they would let me watch the Quarterfinal against Italy there so I just had to be there in three days at 1pm. Actually the perfect plan without loosing too much time: First day: getting to the National Parks, second day: visiting Arches National Park, third day: Canyonlands National Park, fourth day: watching the soccer-match and the distances for each day wouldn't be more than 130km, so far so good:)
As soon as I got out of GJ I followed a country-road not far from I70 following the wide spread out valley to the west. As soon as I reached the border to Utah after 2 hours (no welcome sign here, just a post:/) the well paved road suddenly changed to gravel with lots of potholes on it so it became way more exhausting considering that the temperatures already hit the 35℃/95℉. Not a very good first impression Utah, you can do better than that!
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| At the border to Utah |
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| Gravel road from now on! |
After cycling on this shi**y road for another 10km/6mi it crossed I70 and although it continued on the other side I decided to take the Interstate for the following 20km/12,5mi, which was the way better decision I think. It's not even dangerous at all with all the trucks cause on this huuge shoulder of the road even two persons could easily ride next to each other and you usually can rely on that the road is excellent maintained (on this part it was even recently paved!) You just have to ignore all the traffic, which is pretty easy with my three-months Spotify Premium Account:)
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| Never seen such as long truck before! |
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| No supply, nothing on the next 54 miles (86km)! |
As I got closer to the exit to Moab the sun disappeared behind the clouds and it seemed like a few thunderstorms were building up around me. I just could hope that non of them would come closer cause there was literally no place at all to seek shelter here around! The only thing I could hope was to reach a small town called Cisco, which was about 10km down the road (in direction of the storm!), before the thunderstorm would hit me.
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| Dangerous looking clouds! |
Stormy winds were already picking up when I finally reached Cisco. But there was one problem: Abandoned and party rotten houses, destroyed cars and nobody around I could ask for shelter, Cisco was a ghost town! The only person I met, was a man working at the railroad but he was already about to leave and didn't want to let me in his car so I had to look very quickly for shelter in one of these party destroyed houses, cause the lightning wasn't more than a few kilometers away now. I found a quite intact one and although it had no door or windows anymore or even a lightning rid it still seemed better than nothing and so I waited in there while the storm was getting closer.
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| Cisco, the ghost town |
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| Looks quit creepy! |
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| Where my bike stayed in |
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| Where I stayed in:) |
In the end I was quite lucky, cause the lightning stopped and it was just a short heavy rain and some very strong winds. It still costed me another hour and it became obvious I wouldn't make it to Moab the same day.
After another 15km/9mi the road let into the Colorado-River Valley and would follow the River the whole rest of the way till Moab. The valley soon became a small canyon and right before the road crossed the river at Dewey-Bridge there was a sign which listed a couple of campsites along the Colorado River till Moab. That was perfect for me as I could continue now till sunset and could just pick any of these sites when I would want to.
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| Crossing the Colorado for the very first time at Dewey Bridge |
The canyon now got deeper and more narrow and with the setting sun, the most time completely red rocks became even more dramatic to watch in the red-evening light:) The scenery in the canyon became now more and more impressive which forced me to many stops for taking pictures:)
As the canyon suddenly got wider it gave way to a huuge wide spread out area, surrounded by steep canyon walls and lots of amazing rock formations similar to them I hope to see in Monument Valley. Just stunning!
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| Just stunning! |
At the beginning of this basin I spotted one of these campsites right next to the river and although it was still 40km/25mi to Moab I simply couldn't resist camping at such a beautiful place as the only person around!
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| My campsite:) |
To be able spending most of the next day in the Arches National Park, I got on the road already at 8am the next morning (also because I didn't pay the 10$ apparently requested for one night there:) expecting to get slowed down by all the wonderful views on the last 40km/25mi to the park. Exactly that happened as I was cycling through the canyon and so it got around noon when I finally reached the National Park Visitor Center.
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| Impressions of the Colorado Canyon near Moab:) |
The road into the park is a 30km/19mi dead-end road, which meant a minimum of 60km/37mi return I had to do in the following 9 hours including seeing all the arches in the park. Seemed quite alright, maybe not enough time for everything but at least enough to visit the most amazing spots.
I didn't know that they charge you for visiting the park but as I made a 100km detour extra to get here I didn't mind the 10$ for a whole day.
My plan was then to ask at the Visitor Center for a place to store all my stuff cause it would have slowed me down a lot to take everything with me in the park and would have made it even more difficult for locking all the stuff during the hikes to the arches. I was actually really annoyed, I mean really! when the guy in the Center said simply no. But what drove me angry wasn't the guy himself, it was rather the reason why they can't store anything: It's the law! Since 9/11 he said it is not allowed to store anything in the National Park Centers, as if some terrorist would store a bomb in a National Park Center in the middle of nowhere!
Perfect, now I had to carry all the stuff with me what was really exhausting because of the temperatures (almost 37℃/100℉) and because the road does a lot of steep grades along the whole way through the National Park. As a result the first 20km/12mi took me almost two hours and I hadn't done a single of these short hikes yet! Although you get a lot of nice views along this part of the park (see all the photos below:) it was getting just to exhausting, so on the top of the second climb I decided that I had to get rid of my stuff if I would want to see anything of the park this day! I just waited then until no car was coming, walked like a hundred meters away from the street and hided my bags behind some bushes where nobody could see them. I chose a place where there was no possibility to park anywhere so it would have been pretty much no chance that someone would stop there and walk a hundred meters into the bushes exactly towards my stuff! The bags have been probably even more save there than they would have been in the Visitor Center and I didn't had to be back by 6pm latest when the Visitor Center closes to pick them up, so that was probably the better way to store them anyway.
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| Cycling along the park:) |
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| Balanced rock |
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| Crazy rock formations |
When I continued then it was sooo much more easier and faster, I kinda flew over the roads!!:) By 2:30pm I reached Devils Garden, the place with the most of the arches at the very end of the park, where I planned to do a 10km/6mi - hike to see Landscape- and Double-O-Arch two of the most popular ones. Cause it was soo hot I carried a whole gallon of water + all I had left from Carols snacks!:) The hike itself was quite exhausting in the heat cause it had some steep grades in it but it was definitely worth it to do with lots of stunning views over Devils Garden and the arches of course:)
Cause I took so many photos during the hike which are all worth it to show I putted in all the shots of the Devil's Garden hike down here! :
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| even the parking lot is amazing already:) |
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| Landscape Arch |
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| Forgot the names of these ones:) |
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| Double-O Arch |
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| Me in the lower O :) |
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| Tunnel Arch |
The most impressive spot on this hike was definitely the Landscape Arch! This arch is almost 100m/308ft long and so thin that it doesn't seem to be able to carry a single human! Crazy how something like that can last for such long time, resisting all the weather-changes during the year. But it's definitely the first one to collapse some day. Just 25years ago a 180tons-piece broke off and made the arch even thinner on the right end.
Cause the hike took me almost two and a half hours and I wanted to be out of the park by sunset I decided to skip on the Double-Arch I really wanted to see and do the hike up to Delicate-Arch the most famous arch in the whole west of the US I think, instead! It's even on the quarter dollar of Utah:) But again like the day before, thunderstorms have been developing during the day and of them was about to get really close! Cause Delicate Arch is located pretty much on the highest point in this area in the park, it would have been probably really dangerous up there during close lightning. But cause this was my only chance to get up there and cause thunderstorms can change directions or reform very quickly I just started walking up and watching the storm and would have returned in case it would havd been getting to close. It was the right decision in the end cause the storm changed direction and stayed away a couple of kilometers the whole time so I could climb up the rest of the way to the top.
Man, this arch is definitely the most amazing one I've ever seen so far! Before I'm gonna explain why, just watch the lots of pictures I took there:)
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| Me in the arch:) |
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| Steep climb back out of the park |
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| That would have been Double Arch:/ |
On my way back it started raining a little bit, what has actually been quite refreshing during these temperatures. I just hoped the weather would be getting nice again till the next day when I wanted to visit the Canyonlands National Park. As I expected, all my bags where still where I left them (even hard to find again for me) and fully-loaded I cycled out of the park.
Cause the road to the Canyonlands National Park is also a dead-end road but 60km/37mi long this time, I decided to climb up at least the first 20km to the plateau on 1600m/1mi instead of doing that during the next day-heat. Around 11:30pm I reached a campsite next to the road, (even with tables I could use for cooking!). It was actually a group-campground but cause there was nobody there I just pitched my tent and went to sleep.
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| Leaving Arches National Park |
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| The campsite, you can see the approaching rain on the left! |
The other day I was kinda surprised that I didn't wake up from the morning sun as usual. When I got out of my tent I saw why: The sky was completely covered in clouds and as that wouldn't be enough I could see a "wall" of rain heading towards me. In less than 5 minutes I put all my stuff under the shelter next to my tent and stroke it just seconds before it started raining. It was no thunderstorm this time just heavy, steady rain and as I waited almost an hour I already thought about maybe staying at the shelter till it would stop, skip Canyonlands then and just go on a little bit towards Green River.
But luckily the rain eased around 10am and I decided still to have enough time to see the park, considering that it's mostly overlooks and no hikes like in Arches National Park. Unfortunately the weather didn't seem to get nicer, instead it stayed completely cloudy with showers, dry periods in between and very misty as well because due to the warm temperatures (20℃/64℉) the all the moisture from the ground immediately evaporated after the rain and turned into clouds again.
As I knew already that there wouldn't be any possibility to store my bags, I did the same thing as in Arches National Park again and just hided them behind some bushes, this time before I entered the park so I had an easy ride right from the beginning.
There is actually not really much to say about the park cause it's mostly overlooks over the rim into the endless, wide spread out Canyonlands which, even with bad weather, look absolutely stunning!
This kind of weather even kept the temperatures pretty low so it was no problem to see most of the park during half a day.
The park is mostly located on the so called "Island in the Sky", a plateau high above the Colorado and Green River valleys, completely surrounded by canyons and the only access is a small ridge just wide enough for the street.
The only two things I visited in the park which haven't been canyons were Upheaval Dome and Mesa Arch. Upheaval Dome looks like a crater from an meteor impact as it is shaped like a 4km/2.5mi-wide circle with a hill in the middle. Scientists are still not sure what has been the cause for this geological phenomenon. There're many theories, the meteor impact and a volcanic eruption are just the two most popular ones.
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| Upheaval Dome |
Mesa Arch is as the name implies an Arch. The special thing about it is that it's located right on the rim next to the Colorado side of the plateau and so you can take beautiful photos, sitting under the arch with the Canyonlands in the background. Unfortunately the French girl who took a photo of me wasn't really a super-talent, but I think it would be more worth it during sunshine anyway.
At the very end of then park you could do a 1km-hike on the top of the ridge to the very end of the plateau but because of a close thunderstorm and a lots of mist blowing up from the Green-River side and blocking the view onto this side I skipped this and rather enjoyed the views into the Colorado Canyonlands:)
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| Mesa Arch |
Cause I took a lot of photos again I putted them all together down here:)
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| The steep descent of the Shaver Canyon Road |
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| Colorado Canyonlands |
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| Green River Canyonlands |
Quickly refilling my water bag at the National Park Center and picking my bags up, I headed back to the main road to Green River. As it was getting dark it started raining again and so I continued until 11pm cause I didn't want to do more than 40km/25mi the next day before the soccer-match and I didn't want to pitch my tent in the rain. Again a thunderstorm was getting closer but dissolved as quickly as the rain did and I could finally pull over into the bushes:)
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| My route during this post:) |
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