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Salt Lake City, UT → Grand Junction, CO 299.0 mi (481.2 km) |
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I’m homeward bound, everyone!
I’ve had a great time staying with Flatty in Salt Lake City and wish I could stay longer, but the truth is, I’ve abandoned my garden and really should get home to check up on it. Once the spring rains dry up in LA, plants need a lot more care!
I won’t be heading back all at once, though. I’ve got some stops to make, so I’m winding east to visit a couple more national park sites, even though they’re still closed for COVID-19. Today, I’m starting with Colorado National Monument!
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This red-rocking monument was the dream of John Otto, who lived in the canyon, hand-carved many of the trails, and led the campaign to get it declared a national monument! It was a five-year campaign from 1906 to 1911, when President Taft declared this a national monument! Right off the bat, I could see why. The towering red rock formations, like Balanced Rock, were well worth preserving!
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Heading down the 23-mile Red Rock Drive, my first stop was the visitor center, still closed for the pandemic, which gives me a chance to update some counts. Since my last blog, Utah has gone from 5,175 coronavirus cases to 6,362, a slight slowing! Meanwhile, Los Angeles County has jumped from 25,677 to 31,703! I’m heading back into a lion’s mouth, but for now, I’m okay with Mesa County’s count of 53.
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A storm was rumbling in, so I wasn’t going to have time to do a huge hike today. I started with the Canyon Rim Trail, which promised some great views of Wedding and Monument Canyons!
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The clouds ate up a lot of contrast, but the vistas of the huge magenta sandstone formations were still pretty spectacular! At the end of the trail, as I looked out on the valley and Fruit below, I got a glimpse of Window Rock and the Book Cliffs, just as the sky darkened and the wind picked up.
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Boy, did it ever pick up! By the time I got to the Independence Monument stop, a car-rocking gale had kicked in! Rain crashed into the windows, and lightning flashed for about twenty minutes! I thought I’d have to cut this adventure short, but after hunkering down, I was rewarded with new sunlight overlooking the Independence Monument formation, named by John Otto, who used to climb it every July 4th and raise a flag on top of it! He was also married at its base.
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While the sky had lightened up, the wind sure hadn’t, which made it tough to enjoy the views of the Coke Ovens! While not really ovens, these rounded Wingate Sandstone formations look a lot like the beehive-shaped ovens used to create coke, a kind of fuel made by heating charcoal or oil without air!
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Next up, I reached a viewpoint of Ute Canyon, named for the Ute people, whose ancestors lived here for at least 10,000 years, and they themselves called this place home until 1881, when they were all rounded up and moved to a reservation in northeastern Utah.
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There was, at least, a neat interpretive trail showing off the plants that were important to the Utes. I was partial to the little cacti, myself.
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My last canyon view as the sun sank was Red Canyon, a short, high-walled canyon leading out into the Grand Junction area. Some folks had brought a picnic lunch to enjoy the sunset from here, which seemed like a great idea. I’ll have to remember that next time!
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Instead, I concluded the day’s adventure at the kind of kitchen that served up no food at all: Devil’s Kitchen! That Devil is back again, making wild rock formations! While I wasn’t likely to find dinner here, I was willing to work up a little more appetite with a 3/4-mile stroll to some neat rock formations!
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It was a pretty flat trail that ascended up solid sandstone with the help of some cairns. There were a few people here and there but not enough to worry about social distancing. My only worry was the distant calls of coyotes getting ready for their nightly activities. I’d have to be quick!
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Devil’s Kitchen gets its name because, from a distance, its towering sandstone formations kind of look like a funky oven, or maybe something you’d see in an old Mickey Mouse cartoon, spouting both puffs of smoke and tunes! It was neat to see, but the coming darkness and celebrating coyotes reminded me that I was going to be #saferathome.
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I’ll have at least one more day of Colorado adventures to report tomorrow. I’m excited to share with you and hope you’re staying safe wherever you are!
Good night!
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Total Ground Covered: 1,726.2 mi (2,778.1 km) |
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