Friday, May 4, 2012

Happy Cinco de Mayo!

How to describe today... it felt like the Israelites wandering through the wilderness for 40 years... but wait, there's more... the Israelites wandering while driving in a snow storm on the 380.  I have to say, this isn't going down as my all time favorite day.  :)  I was really happy when we pulled into Moab tonight. :)

I think I'm coming down w/ the sinus stuff that Nick had, so after a rough nights sleep I woke up still a little sick and with a headache.  Not the first time that's happened while on vaca tho, and we headed out from the Circle D Motel to hit some slot canyons.  What a trek.

The road to get to the canyons was PART of the driving on 380 in a snow storm moment.  It was a dirt road for 30 miles in a CIA car.  I thought that Crown Vic was going to eventually just start shedding parts.  You know, you look back and there goes the bumper and then the door.  30 miles at ~30 miles and hour is just painful.  So, we finally got to the turn off and went down and even worse road for 1.7 miles.  When we pulled into the area where people parked there were quite a few vehicles.  We were the only car tho.  lol.  Poor little thing had to chug us through. 

It got so hot out there and we didn't really know where we were suppose to be going.  People stack rocks up into things called "karens (sp?)" you're suppose to follow these stacks of rocks (no signs).  They're not always easy to spot tho. I had just about every Bible story I'd been taught as a child go through my head. It felt like that would have been the landscape that it all took place in. I felt like Ishmael a couple times today -- just throw me under a shaded bush and give me what water is left and leave me to die. lol.

Due to the great remoteness of the area and the length of time we were out there, I managed to have to pee out in the wilderness.  YEA.  :/  Thank God for public restrooms!  Modern conveniences really are a blessing.  :)

Once we finally figured out where we were suppose to be the slot canyons were pretty awesome.  Very narrow in some spots.  I was a little worried about Nick, he struggles w/ a little claustrophobia, but he made it through.  Good job hon!

From there it was off to Moab!  Holy Moly!  The trek from Escalante to Moab was SCARY!!!!!!!!!!   At one point we were almost at 10,000 ft.  Other times the road would narrow down to scary, scary, scary and there were huge drop offs on either sides.  At one point it was like a roller coaster, we came up over such a steep road you didn't know if there was going to be a road going down the other side.  For a moment I think we both got panicky.  :)  What were the settlers thinking?  Don't you wonder?  How did they find these slot canyons, why was it worth it for them to cut roads through this majorly rugged terrain?  How many of them died doing it?  I barely wanted to do it from an air conditioned car.  I guess that's the cool part tho -- the spirit of the settler is still around out here.  People want to be away from people, getting dirty, blazing trails.

So, we finally rolled into Moab.  Moab is a very interesting place.  If a large Catholic family called the Khaki's decided to reunited all their khaki family for a family reunion --- the Khaki's would have that family reunion in Moab.  There are four types of vehicles here, all terrain vehicles, Jeeps, mountain bikes and Jeeps.  Also, there are a lot of men here.  Men in large groups and small groups.  Men, men, men.  Men in khaki driving jeeps. 


A couple we tagged along with part of the way -- he graduated from Iowa.  This picture seems steeper then it actually was.  Lord knows if felt this steep on the way back up!


Tight fits!

Pretty flowers in the middle of desert!



Peek-a-boo Canyon



I think this part got to him a bit.  It was definately tight tight in spots.



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