NOW we're over the hill

Before we left Provo, we got tickets to the BYU Ballroom Dance exhibition held in the Marriott Center on the university campus. This program has produces internationally acclaimed ballroom dancers, having won competitions in Europe many times. And we now know why. They are terrific, and we were amazed at the presentation of various dance steps with up to some 80 dancers on the stage at one time. Really impressive.

The Rim in Moab

We left Provo and headed southeast to Moab, an small tourist town situated between Arches and Canyonlands National Parks. Our campground was at the south end of town, situated under the cliff hundreds of feet high called "The Rim". Remnants of the active mining history around Moab lie scattered at this end of town, not the prettiest part. But we had views of not only the Rim, but also the 11,000 foot La Sal Mountains.

Lizard in Canyonlands

But the jewels in the region are Canyonlands and Arches. We decided to go to Canyonlands first, given that we had maybe one and a half days of good weather, and there was farther to travel up to Canyonlands. This huge park was created in the 1960s, is divided into 3 parts: Island in the Sky, the northern part where we went, the Needles, some 65 miles south of Moab, and the Maze, across the Colorado from the other parts, and inaccessible to mere mortals. Island in the Sky is a large mesa, about 12 miles across. The canyons are some 600-2000 feet below the edge. Jeep roads provide access to the lower canyon, following the White Rim Trail around the lower mesa above the Green and Colorado Rivers, which join in the park.

South Window Arch

The next morning, I cruised up to Arches, much older and more developed for tourism (more signs, parking, sites, etc. Arches is home to some 2000 natural arches, formed by unique geological processes. Some of the standing rock formations are just as impressive as the arches. I spent 3 hours and several rolls of film (just kidding) wandering around in the park. By the time I got to Delicate Arch, the icon on the other Utah license plate (the one that doesn't say, "Best Snow on Earth"), the sky was overcast and the light was completely flat and the rocks were more or less one dimensional. So I skipped the 1-1/2 mile hike up to Delicate Arch and took the long shot from the lower (read: Far Away) viewpoint, where a ranger intern was trying to impress us with facts about kangaroo rats (they drink no water...). I took one last drive inward to "Fiery Furnace", but given the opaque sky, the fire had gone out, so I went home.

Balanced Rock in Arches

We considered staying another day in Moab, but the weather forecast was not kind, so we decided to pack it in and head for Colorado. We tangled with a balky slide awning, which is still attached but not playing nice, requiring a manual roll up and down whenever we want to put our main slide in or out.

We decided to take Utah 128, know to the Moab locals as "The River Road" and to the state as a Scenic Byway. And it was very scenic, following the Colorado River for some 40 miles surrounded by towering red rock cliff walls, canyons of infinite depth, and angry rapids here and there. We began to understand how awed Powell must have been when he made the first boat trip down through these waters some 150 years ago.

In the ghost town of Cisco, we turned right onto a road marked "Not State Maintained" for a 10 mile trip up to I70. The road was OK, but I did have second thoughts, and though it would turn to dirt around the next bend. We stopped at the I70 interchange for lunch, then headed into the Colorado hills.

White Rim Trail and the Green River, Canyonlands

Coming in from the west, I70 is relatively flat until Glenwood Springs. Then the speed limit drops to 50 mph as the road winds through Glenwood Canyon for some 15 miles. After that, it works its way up along the Colorado River, then ascends up to 10,600 feet at Vail Pass. Our 360 HP Cat diesel took this in stride, if slowly.

Now we've been doing this RV thing for well over 5 years, and we've never been shut out at finding someplace to stay for the night. Consuelo uses Delorme Street Atlas, and we have several add on files with locations of Walmarts, Elks Clubs, Flying J Truck Stops, repair shops and the like. We had looked up a couple Walmarts which we figured would be OK for the night. The first one was in Vail. We looked, and looked, and looked, but there was no (visible) Walmart in Vail. The next one was at Copper Mountain, and likewise, invisible. Darkness was falling along with the temperatures. We were getting desperate. We finally cruised through downtown Frisco, and noted a Public Parking lot, which even had a sign stating "Over Night Parking Permitted". To soothe our worried souls, we had a great dinned in a good restaurant, Vinny's, and slept well that night, though our little furnace ran for much of the night keeping us warm. Due to our slide awning problem, we kept the big slide in, which reduce the heat loss. The morning low was 19 degrees.

We rolled back onto I70, climbing to the entrance of the Eisenhower Tunnel at 11,150 feet, admiring the snow covered peaks above us and the snow covered hemlocks below us on the hillsides.We then started the 60 mile descent into Denver. Down, down, down. We are definitely over the hill now.

Sunset at the Flying J in North Platte

After the red cliffs in Moab, Glenwood Canyons, the foamy Colorado, the white peaks of the Colorado 14s, getting out onto the prairie east of Denver to North Platte, Nebraska was, ummm, boring. But it was warmer, and the fuel economy was much better. We stopped the night at a Flying J truck stop there, then rolled today to Lincoln, NE for a few nights.

The bad news as of the moment, our constant companion for 14 years, our faithful puppy Thumper, is in serious pain an almost unable to walk, and not eating fresh cooked chicken and rice. We're concerned.

Moving on up

On the beach in Carrabelle

Leaving Bushnell and hot, hot Florida days behind, we tripped to Carrabelle, FL, a little town west of the Big Bend in the Florida Panhandle. We found an Escapees discount park which just happened to have a site available right on the water's edge. We really enjoyed sitting in our captain's chairs, drinking coffee in the morning, watching the few fisherpersons go out in their inflatable boats, or watching the sandpipers on the beach just below our front bumper.

We also walked along the beach. It's quite a drastic change to watch tides only go up and down by a couple feet, after the 9 foot tides at Jekyll and the 11 foot tides in Maine.


Tricolored heron

One morning visitor we had on the beach was this tricolored heron that was dong some fishing of his own. He had an unusual way of stretching his neck out and turning his head on its side, presumably to see better in the light chop on the water. He didn't appear to be very successful catching fish, but then, he probably eats like a bird.



Saint George Island Light

On Saturday, we hopped into the car and tripped along the shore into Carrabelle, then on to Eastport and the new bridge to Saint George Island. There's a state park on Saint George that we wanted to stay in, but it was full, full, full. We had reservations to go there a couple years ago, and it's still on our list. Where the bridge lands on the island is touristy, but the state park is a wonderful beach park at the eastern end. Small campground, though, only 60 sites.

On Monday, we left Carrabelle with a plan to get the the Escapees park in Summerdale, AL. But we ran into severe thunderstorm, tornado and flood watches and warnings after about 40 miles. We hunkered down in Quincy, FL, in a ratty just-off-the-highway campground for the night. On Tuesday, we rolled into Summerdale, and ended up staying 3 nights there. We got some of our RV repairs and updates done, and Consuelo spent some time with other pine needle basketmakers.

On Friday, with potentially severe weather again on the horizon, we left Summerdale and got as far as Jackson, MS, where we snuggled into the corner of a Flying J parking lot for the night. Our plan had been to get to Vicksburg, but we had a late start.

On Saturday, we travelled to Hot Springs, Arkansas. Since much of this trip was to be on US roads, I was concerned that it would take too long. But the US roads were mostly 4 lane, and traffic was relatively light, so travel was nearly as fast as on the interstates.

Hot Springs Bath House

On Sunday, we toured the Hot Springs National Park. Hot Springs was the first natural resource to be protected by the US fereral government in the 1830s. In the 1920s, it became a National Park.

The park encompasses the hot springs themselves, producing thousands of gallons of clear, clean water at 143 degrees F every day. Said to cure ailments, hot bathing facilities were built to serve the tourists, and the town grew up around this industry. Famous people and gangsters made their way here to relax.

Consuelo in the shower

The luxurious Fordyce Baths were the most luxurious of the bath parlors built, and the building is now the home of the NP Visitor's Center. Catering to larger and larger crowds, the bath parlors added massages, medical devices, exercise machines, and fresh air to their regimen of treatment. The wonder drugs developed by the medical industry caused the decline of hot springs as a primary cure, but the National Park mission still includes managing the output of the springs.