Next up on our hiking adventures after Zion, Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef was Arches National Park. As you might guess from the name, Arches National Park has the densest concentration of natural stone arches in the world. There are over 2,000 documented arches in the park, plus pinnacles, balanced rocks, fins and other geologic formations. Pictured below is Delicate Arch, which was our first hike in Arches. One of the first things I learned is that this arch is the one used in the state license plate for Utah. Other interesting facts about it can be learned here.
Arches is one of the national parks that requires reservations, and when we went to make reservations the earliest time available was 3 p.m. Initially I was disappointed, but that meant we could hit this park the first day after our drive from Capitol Reef, and there were some beautiful photos that we got based on the angle of the sun at that time of day. So it turned out to be a blessing!
First of all, our trip from Capitol Reef. As you might recall from my overview blog of this vacation, there is a lot of "nothin'" between these two parks. We drove for hours without seeing a town, let alone one with a public restroom. I was so happy to finally get to Hanksville, and we visited "Stan's Burger Shack" which had pretty good food AND a nice public restroom (as well as other camping supplies, the usual tourist items, and a gas station). It was almost the "only game in town," certainly on this Sunday in mid-April. While we were waiting for our food I entertained myself by reading the signs they had posted in the rafters:
If you go there you MUST order a milkshake. Talk about THICK, it stood up about 4" above the top of the cup by itself!
Onto Arches... We were staying in nearby Moab, and as we approached town we started to see many vehicles towing trailers that had jeeps on them. Little did we know, but it was the week of the "Jeep Safari" in Moab, so the town was teaming with "jeepers". Another learnt recommedation, don't just check when spring break is in the area you're visiting, but check for any other events that might be scheduled. I'm sure the event drove up the price of our hotel room and made it much more challenging to find space at restaurants, etc. Oh, well, we definitely learned a thing or two on this trip!
Luckily, the hotel Rick booked had us staying on the edge of town, so we were far from the crowds and noise. We checked in and had plenty of time to make it to our park reservation. Silly me, I thought a reservation meant you just showed your piece of paper and drove right in. Nope, it turns out there are MANY people with a reservation time the same as yours. We waited in line for about 1/2 hour, and then showed our reservation, id, and park pass to the ranger at the entry gate. They verified that you were within an hour of the start of your reservation and pasted a blue sticker on our park information guide. All we had to do is show that sticker to the second set of rangers. They have a "roundabout" nearby, so those without reservations can easily turn around.
After that, we were anxious to explore the park, so we skipped the visitor's center this time around. You drive up a winding grade and immediately start seeing the amazing geologic features Arches is known for. On your map, you will find rock formations such as "Three Gossips", "The Organ", and "Tower of Babel". Initially, we had a hard time distinguishing them, although "Three Gossips" is pretty clear!
We sped through the park on our way to Delicate Arch, since we felt like we were getting a late start. We had no trouble finding a place to park at the trailhead, and quickly set off. Again, if you just want a quick overview, here is a video of our hike. If you want more detail, read on...
It was not a difficult hike, although there was a steep climb up a sandstone hill that made me thankful for our hiking shoes/boots. As we were coming down, we saw three Tibetan monks in traditional orange and red robes with their sock/sandal footwear going up. I give them a lot of credit for hiking up a steep sandstone hill in that choice of footwear!
The scenery around us was beautiful! We made our way along a trail, and as we got some elevation we could look back and see a beautiful valley. For over half the climb, we mostly hiked on rock.
As we approached the arch, it is totally hidden until the very end. We climbed a solid rock slab, literally with steps carved into it and a path carved around the back. As I went along this path I was "hugging the inside", but some happy-go-lucky young people (about college age) were practically skipping along the edge. There was a BIG DROPOFF there, so I wasn't nearly so cavalier. I guess I'm just getting risk-adverse in my old age!
The entire view from this vantage point is amazing. Here's a panoramic of what you see all around you.
There is a long wall that you can lean against or sit on. As you can imagine, many people were trying to get their photo under the arch. We didn't want to wait around for that, so after taking some photos we headed back down. What a beautiful site, though! I can see why it is featured on their license plate. We experimented with different views and then realized that catching the La Sal Mountains in the background made it even more beautiful.
Our hike down was pretty uneventful. This is where I first noticed the "waterpockets", which, according to my book on Utah geology, are caused by rainwater dissolving the cement between sand grains, allowing them to be blown away. Aren't they interesting?
I also noticed some beautiful flowers and an interesting tree on the way back down. Even in this desert enviroment there is so much beauty!
Near the bottom of this hike was a detour over to petroglyphs. After learning about desert varnish in the last blog, I now have a bigger appreciation for the longevity of these carvings. And I learned that the Ute Indians are where Utah got it's name!
After our hike we decided to drive through the remainder of the park to get an idea of what we wanted to do on our return (we had another reservation at 3 p.m. the following day). We absolutely marveled at the beauty of the rock formations and scenic landscape. See below for a shot of "Fiery Furnace". Of course, we wondered how they got the red and white colors seen, and the very helpful sign at the viewpoint explained:
"Most of the rocks in Arches National Park owe their color to the presence or absence of iron. When iron oxidizes, similar to a nail rusting, it gives the rock a red color like here at Fiery Furnace, where the sandstone fins glow like flames at sunset. Bands of white occur where water has removed the iron or bleached the rock through chemical reaction."
We drove to the end of the road, made the loop at the Devils Garden campground, and returned, marveling all the while at the beautiful colors illuminated by the setting sun. Here are a few examples of the views.
The rock features that we had passed early on in the park were made even more beautiful by the sun's angle.
We made our way out of the park and enjoyed a quiet evening in Moab. By then we were starving, and after a few tries to find a place to eat we ended up with Thai food. The food was so amazing that Rick went back the following night!
The next day we were up bright and early. We planned to hit Canyonlands in the morning, then return to Arches for our 3 p.m. reservation. We made that work, but this day turned out to be WINDY! Check out my hair in our National Park selfie! And this was in a relatively sheltered spot near the visitor's center. I am so glad we did the Delicate Arch hike the day before, as being high on that sandstone would have been a challenge in these strong winds.
Since we had already hiked at Canyonlands earlier in the day, we decided to stick with the popular, near-the-road arches for this second day. We thought we'd save the park system a visitor guide and re-use the one from the day before, but the rangers were smart and changed the color of the "dot" used to indicate you have a reservation! Now we have two versions of the same document with different color dots. So much for saving paper! But I could see where less-scrupulous types would try to re-use a previous reservation for another day.
Our first stop was Balanced Rock, which was Rick's favorite (as you can tell by the number of photos of this view!). This view is literally right off the road, and while there is a short loop hike we just took photos from the parking lot.
In case you're wondering how this rock was formed, it is made of two different rock formations. The balanced rock itself is Entrada Sandstone, the primary arch-building formation in the park. The pedestal it sits upon is part of the Carmel Formation, which erodes more easily. As the pedestal slowly erodes, it will be harder and harder for the rock to stay balanced, so you might want to go see it soon! Apparently part of the rock fell off in the 70's, aptly named "chip off the old block".
Next, we went on to the "Windows Section", which is a very popular destination. Right off the road are four arches that form "windows". See this panoramic view of Turret Arch (right) and North and South Windows (left). I actually climbed up to the lower part of Turret Arch.
While it might not look high, here is a view with people in it to give you proper scale.
Here is my favorite view of North and South Windows.
As you can imagine, this was a very popular spot so most of my close-ups of these arches had lots of people in them. However, this video gives you an idea of the wind we were facing.
My most favorite arch in this area is "Double Arch". I couldn't resist taking pictures of Rick's footprints as another example of the wind we were facing. His print going to the arch was no longer than a minute older than the print coming back. The dust was blowing so hard that we ended up with it everywhere, including our ears!
Here are my favorite shots of Double Arch.
While we drove through the park again hoping to get more sunset shots, the lighting was not cooperating and the wind was making us downright tired. So I'll wrap up with my favorite shot to cap off this park.
Next up, Canyonlands.
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