Canyonlands National Park

Moab, Utah is home to 2 National Parks, and was to be our stop for a couple of days. I had been having pretty good luck finding RV parks that were first come first served in California, but all that came to a halt at Zion! Zion was crazy packed, and we got crazy nervous that there wouldn’t be any place for us to park the trailer that night. We ended up finding some amazing BLM land (Bureau of Land Management – federal land – our land!) to rest our tires on. That introduced us to the wide variety of BLM land available in Utah and especially around Moab.

Our (free!) campsite has us at the bottom of some super fun rocks for the boys to climb, and in the distance, you can see Arches National Park! We are prepared to live off the grid for a couple of days, propane is cheap and it won’t be so hot that we’ll need air conditioner to run.

We set up camp mid morning, and then took off to Canyonlands National Park for the afternoon. It’s hard to describe all the beauty that is here, it’s similar to the Grand Canyon but on a larger level(is that even possible!?!?). Again as we did at Bryce Canyon, it is like we are driving on the top of the mesas, looking down into the canyons, crevices and such.

Our first stop let us to a crazy steep and long canyon, and the next stop led us to the mesa arch, one of the famous landmarks in the park. It was my first natural rock arch to see up close and it was amazing. It was right on the edge of the mesa, and shot straight down on the other side. It had cracks in it that made it look like it could collapse at any time reminding us how fragile all the landscape is.

What was crazy about today, is that it was windy. A steady 30 mph but gusts of up to 50 mph were recorded. It was insane being close to ledges with that wind, turned me into a nervous Nelly for sure!

Woody participated in the junior ranger program here, and he was also awarded the Resource Stewardship Scout Ranger patch. He earned the patch by participating in many junior ranger programs, picking up trash at many of the parks, learning about protecting natural and cultural resources and sparking awareness in National Parks. What a neat opportunity for him to continue on with Boy Scouts on our travels. (MT)