Can you see me shouting "Hurray" in the picture? Where am I? I am standing under the famous "Delicate Arch" in Arches National park, Utah. It did take quite a bit of hike to get there, but it was all worth it. We visited Salt Lake city, Arches and Canyonlands National parks this labor day weekend.We flew into Salt Lake city on Friday evening. We rented a car at the airport and drove around. First, we visited the Mormon temple in temple square in Salt Lake city. The buildings were huge and beautiful with lots of flowers and fountains. My son wanted to play in the water for ever. We had dinner in SLC and drove to Moab - about 250 miles from SLC. We had rented a single bed room vacation condo. It was furnished and had a full kitchen and worked out cheaper than a hotel room.
Next morning (Saturday), we visited Arches National park (about 5 miles from Moab). The day was mostly cloudy and we did not feel the heat that much. But, we could not click those great pictures of rocks glowing in sunlight. We hiked the park avenue trail and saw the balanced rock and then, had lunch. We packed our lunch as these parks do not have cafes or stores. Then we hiked to the Double Arch and then the "Windows" section. We saw the "North Window", "South Window" and "Turret Arch". These hikes were easy. I have to mention one thing here, my husband carried our 17 month old son in a backpack carrier and I carried the water and food. Then we hiked to the "Delicate Arch" upper viewpoint. It is a short hike involving some climbing. The last hike of the day was the hike to the "Delicate Arch" itself. It is about 3 miles with no shade and parts of the trail being steep. This hike is a sunset favorite, but the clouds covered the sunset that evening. After clicking many pictures we turned back. My husband made Maggi noodles with lots of veggies for dinner (advantage of having a kitchen).
Sunday morning was a hot clear day, which meant great photos, but tired us!! We drove to Canyonlands National park, Island in the sky district (33 miles from Moab)
. This is the most accessible and most visited part of Canyonlands. We did not have time to visit the Needles district, which is supposed to be beautiful too. The Maze district (the last one) is true wilderness with primitive conditions. It can be reached by ATV only and is the least visited. The first thing we did at island of the sky was to hike up to "Upheval Dome" on a moderate trail. "Upheval Dome" is a huge crater formed by either displaced salt beds or a meteor invasion (still a mystery as to how it got there) eons ago. We hiked to both the first and second view points. The hike to the second viewpoint was a little difficult and did not give any better view than the first viewpoint (so, a little waste of time, I'd say).Then we saw whale rock, a red slickrock shaped like a huge whale, from the parking lot. There is a moderate trail to go to top of the rock. We did not have the time to hike u
p there. Next stop was Aztec's butte for few pictures. Then we drove to the most beautiful "Grand view point" overlook. The canyon has been carved by the Colorado river and a bit similar to the Grand Canyon. The red canyon glowing in the background mesmerized me. I stood there staring into the wilderness and did not want to leave. We clicked many pictures and went to our next stop - Mesa Arch. A simple hike to the beautiful yellow arch. My son (17 months old) hiked all the way up there by himself and had a lot of fun. Our last stop of the day was "Green river overlook" at sunset. We clicked some pictures and drank the beauty of sunset over the canyon and drove back to Moab. We ate at the Schezwan Chinese restaurant in Main Street. The food tasted good, but was a bit too oily.Day 3 (Monday) we visited Arches again. At the visitor center, we watched a 15 minute video about Arches and Canyonlands which I liked very much. We drove up to the Devil's garden trail head to hike up to the famous L
andscape arch, which is also the longest. Short and easy side trails lead to Tunnel and Pine arches. The trail is easy up to Landscape Arch and then it becomes steep leading to the "Double O" arch and then to a single darker rock named "Dark Angel". Steep side trails lead to Partition Arch and Navajo arch. There is also a challenging primitive loop leading to more arches. We could not go further than Landscape arch due to lack of time. After lunch, we took a short easy hike to skyline arch.Then it was time to go on the ranger lead Fiery Furnace hike. Fiery Furnace is a group of tall chimney shaped, warm deep red rocks which glow at sunset. This hike can either be done with a ranger or you need to get a hiking permit. We had paid $10 per person and booked the ranger hike in advance on Saturday and it was really worth it. We got to crawl through small spaces, walk on narrow ledges, jump across rocks, chimney through narrow openings, see some great views and understand and appreciate the desert landscape better. It was close to sun
set when the hike was over and I clicked some more pictures of the glowing fiery furnace. I really could not stop clicking but, we still had two more arches to visit. A short walk in the red sand lead us to Sand dune arch which our son loved. We started towards broken arch and returned without seeing it as it had gotten dark.We drove back to the visitor center to freshen up and change and then drove back to Moab for dinner in "Baja Grill" on Main street. Food was delicious. We had to drive back to SLC to take our early morning flight. We started from Moab around 11.00 PM and reached SLC around 3.00 AM. We returned the rental car and waited in the airport for the next 3 hours to take our flight back home. We were totally exhausted, but the trip was a lot of fun and will be remembered for ever.
I was told by some fellow tourists that "Dead Horse Point State park" carved by the Colarado river, which is close to Canyonlands is also supposed to be very beautiful. We missed it due to lack of time.
See more pictures of our trip at: http://picasaweb.google.com/srihari.kutti/LabourDay2009TripSLCArchesAndCanyonlands?authkey=Gv1sRgCKv7uuvQ4oH_9AE#
Photo Legend:
Pic1: Delicate Arch, Arches National park
Pic2: Monument basin from Grand View point overlook, Canyonlands National park
Pic3: Mesa Arch, Canyonlands National park
Pic4: Landscape Arch, Arches National park
Pic5: Fiery Furnace, Arches National park
