Meet ups with friends & family
As we headed south to Arizona from Lake Powell, our friends headed north to explore more of southern Utah. They called to tell us about Cedar Breaks National Monument, which they described as one of the most beautiful places they’ve seen in the area. That was enough of an endorsement for us to set our course from Sedona. We’re glad we did!
We met Malcolm and Judy while riding tandem bicycles just a few weeks before we got married, so this friendship goes back 31 years. They recently retired to Sedona, Arizona where they’re exploring their new southwestern playground and remodeling their new home. From Lake Powell, we were so close that not visiting was not an option. Delightful visit!
Just when you think you’ve had enough of red rock photos, we’re here for you! We’re off to the other end of Lake Powell (recall our first encounter with the lake was 200 miles north in Hite). Although the reservoir level remains relatively low, there’s plenty of lake left for the marinas near Page, Arizona to flourish.
Capitol Reef National Park is the most remote of the Southern Utah parks. Unique geological movements created a 100-mile wrinkle in the earth’s surface the eventually eroded into an angled reef surrounded by various shapes, sizes and colors of crazy rock formations. The unique movements also enabled the Fremont River to run year-round, creating the basis for settlement. The soil, climate and isolation were perfect for fruit orchards. Fruita, the remains of the historical town within Capitol Reef, is literally and figuratively an oasis in the desert.
Canyonlands National Park is a vast and quiet place compared to Arches. It’s divided into 3 distinct districts: Island in the Sky, Needles, and the Maze. The latter can only be accessed by jeeps and off-road vehicles, so we won’t be visiting the Maze. We did visit Island in the Sky during our stay in Moab.
Continue reading “Canyonlands National Park, Part 1 – Island in the Sky”
Last October in Memphis at the Blues Guitar Unleashed (BGU) Live gathering, several of us jammers stayed at the Tom Sawyer Mississippi River Campground in West Memphis, Arkansas. Among that crew were Michael (known as Stringbreaker on the BGU forum) and his wife, Kat. Michael and Kat live in Moab and they told us we should stop by if we were ever passing through there. Ding ding ding!
Continue reading “Jamming with Stringbreaker”
This is our first visit to Utah canyon country, and likely not our last. It’s magical! And we’ve only just begun…
Our foray into New Mexico was actually another blues guitar visit. We’ve met my friend Steve twice before in real life, and he and I have been friends online through the BGU forum for several years. Steve told me, in a reply to a forum post I made last year in which I detailed the states we planned to visit, that there was a mistake in my list – I’d left out New Mexico. Well, to me that sounded pretty close to an invitation to visit the legendary Compound within which Steve and his lovely wife Hyacinth reside, and I vowed not to make that mistake again this year.
We had a great visit last October with Mike & Tania, Doug’s cousin, in Franklin, TN. At that time, they declared that we must someday meet Mike’s brother Charles, since we had so much in common – biking, hiking, RV adventuring, etc. Toward than end, they provided a virtual introduction via email.
If you’ve never trusted your trip, vacation or summer to a computer algorithm, it’s worth a try. Key your destination into Google Maps, select ‘avoid highways’ and follow the mathematically optimized route that will take you places you’d never find on your own while avoiding difficult left turns and heavy traffic. Continue reading “Squirrel!”