A Fork in the Road

We woke this morning and said lets get to some place cooler. Our destination Salt Lake City (not really cooler) but north. As we were driving and I was relived to be going to a more populated place we came to a fork in the road. If we continues straight we go to Salt Lake City if we go left we see Bryce Canyon and Zion National Park, which we were going to see on the our way back home. I was warring with myself wanting to see these National Parks or getting to a city. Practicality won and we went left to Bryce Canyon. It was a good decision.

Glen Canyon Recreational Area

aka Lake Powell. So far this is the most remote place we've been. We drove into Halls Crossing. The roads were so quiet I thought for sure we were going the wrong way, again. We were going the right way and found our way to the Ferry. The Ferry took us to Bullfrog, which has camp grounds, visitor center, a marina, a lodge, a restaurant and a gas station. There may be other things but I didn't see them. There are no hook ups at the camp ground but so far it has been the biggest and nicest site. I think they made them extra big since people bring all kinds of water crafts. Oh, did I mention it was over 100 degrees every day.

Canyonlands and Dead Horse Point State Park

We went to Canyonlands National Park. We were comparing it to the Grand Canyon and I heard other people talking in different languages and referring to the Grand Canyon. We were going to camp in the back country but decided against it because only 2 sites were booked (we figured it probably wasn't the best time of year to camp) and it is hotter in the canyon that on the rim.

We also stop at Dead Horse Point State Park it has a very dramatic view of the Colorado River from 2000 feet down sheer cliffs, Defiantly one of the top ten places in my book. The name is a little sad, there are different ledgends to why it got it's name ....

Arches National Park

I don't know how to describe the beauty in these rock.

They are breath taking.

They are fun.

We climbed togehter to this really cool .... I don't know what its called.

Look at balanced rock.

How long do you think before it tumbles down?





Arches National Park is Magical.

Moab UT

We left Telluride for Moab it was supposed to be a 3 hour trip. We took a wrong turn and ventured down a dirt/gravel road. After too long we met up with another truck and asked the old rancher if we were headed in the right direction. "Nope" We then asked where we might turn around and he said (get this) "open the red gate and turn around in the pasture". If we hadn't run into him we would have ended up back in Montorse, CO. The whole time we were on the dirt road we saw 2 cars (one of them gave us help) and a guy on an ATV.

It took us 5 hours to get to Moab.

4th of July

We were in Telluride for the 4th of July. What a spectacular celebration. We had our chairs set up right on Main Street for the parade.

First came the Veterans for whom we can thank for our freedom.

The floats, cool cars, horses and finally the Jet fighters that fly 200 feet about our heads. ZOOM They fly right down Main St and toward the mountains. It seems like they are going to crash into the and pull up last minute.

It's heart stopping and we are just standing on the ground.

Later in the day we enjoyed the festivities at Town Park. The kids played shoe toss (you can use your imagination) and tried to catch trout with their bare hands. Morgan almost got one but she said "it slipped out of my hands".

To end the day we watched a spectacular display of fire works. The echo in the Valley was the icing on the cake.

Are we there yet?

We finally reached Montrose the largest city near Telluride (about 50 miles away). We decided to stay the night and decompress we had driven about 650 miles the past few days. After a relaxing night we drove to Telluride. Since we didn't have phone service aka GPS I was reading a map. Not so well I might add.

This next stretch of road was the thinnest, scariest, most sheer cliff road I have ever seen. Believe me I've seen my share of mountain roads. We drove all the way to San Juan County past Silverton (an old mining town), to Red pass (that's where I think we were). Fortunately we were able to turn around. The way back was better since we were next to the mountain not the cliff. We found the right turn drove back up the mountain on the right side this time. This road was a lot better drive. I don't know how anyone drives these roads in the winter.

We made it to Doug and Katie's house. The picture is the view from Doug's living room. Isn't it awesome?