Every fall Paul and I like to take our ATV's out for a weekend adventure and this year we decided to head down to southeast Utah and the beautiful, scenic Canyonlands area in and around Moab. We had not been to this area for years. Back when our kids were still at home -- Heidi in high school, Cameron in middle school and Katie in elementary school -- we did alot of mountain biking and took quite a few trips here. Those were great times and we had so much fun pedaling around these spectacular rock formations: White Rim trail which is a three-day self-supported ride that follows the rim of the Colorado River (we did it twice and I always drove the support vehicle while everyone else rode their bicycles), Slickrock, Gemini Bridges, Monitor and Merrimac. I'm sure glad we have graduated to machines instead of pedals! Not nearly so much work! We had no idea where to go or what to see so we found a guide book specifically for ATV's at the Visitors Center. There are 30 rides listed and rated by easy, moderate and difficult. So with that guidebook and "dumb luck" we went on the most amazing adventures!
The state of Utah is so blessed with tons of beautiful, diverse scenery. There are 5 National Parks here and lots more State Parks as well. You aren't allowed to ride motorized vehicles off road in the national parks but there are tons of trails surrounding those lands. Our rides skirted Canyonlands National Park and Arches National Park. The weather forcast for the weekend was not very promising before we left home and we almost considered not going. But then we decided, what the heck, we would just pack up warmer clothes and be prepared for rain. You know the saying, "if you bring an umbrella, you'll never need it; but if you don't bring one, you'll wish you had." There was lots of strong winds most of the days but we never got rained on while ATVing.
Now the real reason we went to Moab is that Paul wanted to ride his bicycle in the Moab century ride (a century is 100 miles). So he signed up for this ride and then we thought, hey let's go a couple days before and bring the ATV's along. Unfortunately, all the rain fell on the bicycling portion of the weekend which was not pleasant at all. He still went out and did the "metric Century" which is 60 miles. I really have to hand it to him... he is tough!! I'd have written that off and gone shopping!! (TONS of cute shops -- so nice to see a Main Street in a small town that actually has a thriving business in every storefront!)
In the three days we were there, we went on four wonderfully enjoyable rides. Each ride took about 2-3 hours. Each ride was so different. On some rides we saw massive rock formations, columns, spires, arches, boulder fields and some rides we saw flat land covered with sagebrush and grass. On one ride we came across some sand dunes -- you feel like you are floating across the top of the sand. Some trails lead down into canyons where you looked up to see these massive rock walls along both sides; some trails took you up so high that when you looked over the edges you couldn't even see the canyon bottom. You want to stay away from those edges... your stomach tells you when you are getting too close!
I'll post some more photos for the next few days because you will be impressed with the sights. And unfortunately, these photos don't come close to truly doing justice to the beauty of this scenery. What a polar opposite from the Blue Ridge Parkway!!!
