We drove east down Willow Springs Wash, past Deadman Peak and east across Mussentuchit Flat until we were east of Cedar Mountain looking down into John’s Hole.

We then worked our way around Chimney Canyon until we could look down into Seger’s Hole. We had driven one of my Ford Explorers down into Seger’s Hole one year and I really didn’t feel like doing that again. However, we could see a lot of interesting country in the distance that we would like to explore. Maybe we will come back some day and try that trail again.

We found a faint trail that followed along the highest ridge until we hit better roads in an area called Horse Heaven on the east side of the Moroni Slopes.

We drove as far south as we could so we could get a quick glimpse into some canyons and take pictures of Factory Butte far off to the south.

We enjoyed a wonderful sunset as we headed back.

So much for our 2008 trips.

We then took off to drive south on our favorite washboard road, the Hole-in-the-Rock road, past Dancehall Rock and parallel to Fortymile Bench and the Straight Cliffs.

It was about 35 miles to the trailhead for Willow Gulch were we began our hike down canyon almost two miles to Broken Bow Arch. It was afternoon and the days are short so I didn’t get to linger as much as I wished. Still it was nice to see that Broken Bow Arch was still there and still impressive.

Walking down this canyon affords several trail options. When I first hiked this canyon years ago, I chose to take the dry rincon loops but still managed to fall thigh deep into a pool of quicksand. This time we mostly followed the small stream course down and ended up doing a lot of bushwacking. On the way back, we chose the dryer and probably faster routes. Either way, it was a real pleasure to walk the quiet canyon with the cottonwood trees bright yellow in fall foliage.

We arrived back to the Explorer just after sundown when the air immediately turned cold. Two more hours of washboard road driving put us back in Escalante but in foul moods. Warm beds and a couple of aspirin helped though.

Sunday morning we drove east and then north across the Escalante River and along the HogBack to Boulder Utah. This area is one of my most favorite locations in the entire world so I was content to just meander with no real destination in mind. My (and David’s) Great-Great Grandfather Christian Moosmann homesteaded, farmed and raised cattle in the Escalante and Boulder areas. We have lots of Moosman and Justet family buried in the small community cemeteries. It almost seems like home here.

From Boulder we drove the Burr Trail eastward, poking along in Long Canyon just enjoying the sights and taking pictures.

We spent a little time poking around the Wolverine Petrified Wood Natural Area but couldn’t make ourselves get out of the vehicle and do any hiking.

We also spent some time around Muley Twist Canyon area before dropping off the switchback and joining the Notom road which we took north back to highway 24.

Along the Notom road, we stopped to examine a small class ‘D’ arch that we had just noticed for the first time. It was called Bow String Arch.

Once we hit the main highway, we turned east and headed to Hanksville Utah. We arrived in the Factory Butte area about sunset which allowed for some nice last minute picture taking.

After picking up a Mountain Dew in Hanksville, we headed north for the long trip back to the Provo and Orem area. Reluctantly, we both had to be back at work the next morning. They just don’t make weekends long enough. Sigh…

Anyway that is the direction we started off on. The trail climbs from the “Potash Road” parking lot up a slope, across the Potash train track and then east along the hills to Corona Arch. However we got sidetracked when we hit the train tracks.

We decided to follow the tracks until they disappeared into a train tunnel that pops out near the Moab highway in 1.2 miles. Along the way we found a natural arch we had heard about called Quixotic Arch. It turned out to be larger than we expected which was a pleasant surprise.

I also found a gold nugget which currently resides on my desk at work. (Ok, it’s probably just fool’s gold but it looks real enough.)

After exploring the tunnel a bit, we headed back to the trail and finished our hike past Bowtie Arch to Corona Arch (also sometimes called Little Rainbow Arch). There were a number of other people on the trail including a family that climbed the Moqui steps to reach the top of the arch. That was a little more climb than I wanted to try but I had to at least look at it.

We were going to also hike across the canyon to visit Pinto Arch but were too tired by the late afternoon. That would have to be another trip. We were close enough to take telephoto pictures of it, at least.

On the way back to Moab, we took advantage of the setting sun to take reflection pictures along the Colorado River and even some petroglyph pictures. It was a nice warm day followed by a pleasant, calm evening.

Then it was a long drive home again that night. Luckily, the days are still short enough to force us to get an early start on the drive home.

After taking a few pictures around the old uranium mines in The Poison Strip, we drove east and then south almost to the end of the road on Winter Camp Ridge. We then parked and hiked just over a mile to the northwest, to the cliffs overlooking Lost Springs Canyon. Here we could look down on Covert Arch just below us and enjoy a grand view of the canyon.

On our hike back to the Cherokee, my son got a phone call on his iPhone, from my wife who didn’t know that Cory had gone with us for the day. We were surprised that he could receive a phone call out in the hills like that and I immediately resolved to never take an iPod with us on a trip where part of the purpose is to get away from it all. That was a bit disturbing.

After getting back to the vehicle, we then drove back to the main road and continued southeast a short distance so we could also visit and take pictures of La Boca Arch.

By then the day was getting long so we headed for home again. (We had gotten a late start and burned a lot of the day just enjoying the scenery.)

Saturday we drove over to the Ute Mountain lookout tower on the mountain south of Manila Utah. This is one of the few remaining forest fire lookout tower in the western United States. This tower has special significance to my family since my Grandparents, Ida & Buell Bennett, manned this tower during World War II for two years (probably 1943-44 or so). They lived in a trailer and tent near the base of the tower while my mother (about 11 years old) lived in the tower.

Whenever a fire was spotted (usually lightning caused) my Grandfather and a couple of other forest service men, would walk out to the fire and be gone for several days while they fought the fire with hand tools. This left my Grandmother and my mother to man the lookout tower.

The tower was built by hand (no cranes) by a CCC troop stationed nearby. My Great-Grandfather, John Bennett, directed the building.

Since my Mother and Father was in our group of their children and grand-children, my Mother decided she wanted to climb the rickity wooden stairs to the top. Inasmuch as she is deathly afraid of heights, I thought that this was going to be a problem but she forced herself to go up and did just fine even coming down later. She was able to speak with the seasonal manager that is assigned to meet tourists, and swap information. Apparently, there are huge gaps in the history that the Forest Service has on the Ute Mountain Lookout Tower.

After leaving the lookout tower, most of us also drove out the Dowd Mountain road to the overlook at the end of the road. After a few pictures and spending some time watching the boats on Flaming Gorge through binoculars, we headed back to the cabin.

The 2 mile trail from Aspen Grove does climb a bit but for the most part, it traverses the mountain laterally. While the day was fairly hot, a good deal of the hike was under the cover of pine and aspen trees. By the time I returned, the mountain itself provided complete shade for most of the trip back.

The cascade (or waterfall) was delightful. The mist provided by the waterfall created an air conditioner effect to the point where it was almost too cool. There were a number of other hikers at the falls so I had to wait quite a bit for people to clear out of the picture. (I’m not used to people in my pictures.)

The hike was energizing and I was back home again early enough to barbeque dinner that night on my back yard deck.

What a nice way to spend the day!

Before visiting the park, we had to bounce around some of the small communities in the Far West area so I could take some pictures of old barns and town buildings. We finally found ourselves at Antelope Island State Park.

Though there are antelope on Antelope Island, the main feature is the American Bison (Buffalo) herd that is maintained here. They wander freely across the island and usually have the right-of-way on the roads.  Because of the low lake level (because of the drought) the buffalo have been wading across the shallow parts of the lake and ending up in people’s backyards in Layton and Kaysville Utah. The park cowboys then have to herd them back across the lake to the island by horseback.

On the day we were there, the main Buffalo herd seemed to be concentrated mostly on the eastern shore. I tried to get telephoto pictures of the herd with the lake and downtown Salt Lake City but wasn’t too impressed with the results.

We drove down to the Fielding Garr Ranch on one of the few park roads. We wandered around the historical ranch taking pictures before heading back.

We puttered around until about sunset to see if there were any picture opportunities as the sun disappeared into the Great Salt Lake. We then headed home again.

It was a nice leisurely day.

After work onFriday, August 15th, David and I drove out to Vernal Utah and stayed overnight with our folks so we could get a good start on Saturday morning.

We drove down through Ouray Utah and soon entered what is considered the north Book Cliff country. This area is mostly low rolling hills of cedar tree and sagebrush. (The southern Book Cliffs are mostly larger rolling hills of brush and some pine or aspen trees.) In the northern end, oil production dominates with many miles of oil field pumps, oil pipe lines and all of the dirt roads that access them. It can be a little intiminating because every hill looks the same and there is nothing on the horizon to orient yourself to. A lot of people get lost out here including oil field works.

Because this area is so vast and the drive is so long, the oil field workers have a tendency to travel rather fast. Luckily you can see their dust plume for miles before they pass you. We found one truck along side the road missing a front tire and rim. It looked like it had rolled in the last couple of days but no one was around. Later we passed a flat bed hauling another pickup that had also lost an entire front tire assembly. Yet later we saw several wheels with hubs along the road. (Remind me to never purchase a used oil field vehicle.)

We drove south down the Seep Ridge Road and stopped at the Willow Creek overlook to take a few pictures.

We then headed northeast to an area where I had a location on a map indicating a natural arch was located there. We found the location which required a short hike out to a wash. There was no natural arch but the many cannonball rock formations was interesting.

To explore as much of the area as we could, we continued east and then north to loop back through Red Wash and Bonanza Utah. Along the way, we jumped a cougar crossing a wash near Bitter Creek. It was long gone before I could get a picture, of course.

Most of this area was not what we consider “Natural Arch country”. However, a few places could have hidden arches and bridges. We spent some time exploring jeep trails along West Asphalt Wash but didn’t find much to take pictures of.

We did find a small class D natural arch along Evacuation Creek. (At least we didn’t go home empty handed!)

We also stopped near the Rainbow and Watson ghost towns as well as the gilsonite mining trench for a few pictures.

About sundown, we were within sight of Vernal Utah again. We were also surprised to find out that there was an area where you could view Vernal, Roosevelt and Jensen Utah all at the same time.

While we didn’t see all of the north end of the Book Cliffs, I think we saw enought that we don’t need to go back again. The next time we can head deeper into the southern Book Cliffs.

On the way back to Utah Valley the next day, we took a side trip to revisit the Strawberry Pinnacles and drive along the Strawberry River near Duchesne Utah. We didn’t have time to travel all of the canyon roads in that area but they were interesting enough to want to come back some time.

The extended family was assembling at my parents place to help install a sprinkler system, something that had been needed for a long time. So Saturday found all available kids and grand-kids on the end of shovels and dragging pipe. It was hot work but we had a few clouds in the afternoon that helped keep it a little cooler.

A couple of my brothers had rented a trencher machine so most of the deep and heavy work was done. We just had to join the trenches and run the pipe.

However late in the afternoon, we found that the trencher had cut the power cable that ran to the sheds. We were trying to figure out how to best patch the wires when Dad was sent to look for some wire strippers. Soon he returned and announced “Sorry, no strippers”. I immediately heard my son behind me groan “Oh…” in disappointment. (No, not that kind of strippers!)

It took a while before we could get back to serious work again.

The next morning was Sunday and no work was going to be done that day. Fairly earlier that morning, I took off by myself so I could visit nearby Dinosaur National Monument in Jensen, Utah. I wanted to take some pictures at the Split Mountain raft ramp as well as some Indian petroglyphs just across the Green River bridge, in a side canyon to the east.

The second time that I ever visited these petroglyphs (many years ago when I was living in Vernal), a cougar screamed from the cliffs above me! THAT was a fearsome sound to hear echoing down the canyon. I immediately walked back to my vehicle parked nearby and didn’t stray far from it for the rest of the canyon trip.

After several hours enjoying the area, I had to hurry back to Vernal for church and a fantistic dinner organized by my wonderful mother. Then it was a three hour drive to get home that afternoon.

Instead of heading into Moab itself, we turned off the Canyonlands National Park “Island-in-the-Sky” road heading west and then south to the top of the mesa. We then took the Gemini Bridges road east to Arth’s Pasture.

On the way, we stopped when the road approached Bull Canyon so we could take pictures of Calf Arch on the opposite cliff wall.

We then picked our way on jeep trails heading northeast until we were almost to the rim of the cliffs overlooking Moab Canyon and the highway into Moab Utah.

We first visited Jack’s Arch hidden in the rocks at the north end of Arth’s Pasture. We were surprised that the jeep trail hadn’t gotten much use since the last time we were there several years ago.

After taking pictures of Jack’s Arch, we tried hiking up the edge to get a view of Double Eclipse Arches by approaching from the south cliffs. However, it was WAY too hot to be hiking and the short hike about killed us. When we finally got to a cliff where we could look across the short canyon to Double Eclipse Arches, we were wasted. That ended our plans to climb down to the arches like we did the first time we visited this area. However, it was obvious that the easiest way back to the Explorer would be to finish a loop and pass just above the arches on out way down the short side of the canyon cliffs.

Because of the position of these arches, it just isn’t possible to get a good picture. Even when we climbed down to the arches years ago, I didn’t get a decent picture.

By then the afternoon was getting late so we didn’t have to wait long for the cool shadows to cover the next canyon to the south. We did a little more hiking to visit Elevator Arch, Stargate Arch and Gateway to Forever Bridge.

After a hot days in the hills, we REALLY enjoyed the Mountain Dew slushies that we could buy in Green River Utah. A large MD slushie was what got me home that night.