From Kanab UT to Rapid City SD

Sat. 6/9/2012     We left Kanab UT and headed sort of NE with our final destination of Rapid City SD.  The first day was a long windy day from Kanab at the Utah/Arizona border to Manila UT at the Utah Wyoming border.  At the end of that day we made it to the Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area which is in both Utah and Wyoming.

Flaming Gorge

Only 3 of dozens of Pronghorn we saw

When we left Manila UT the next morning we didn't know exactly how far we were going.  As soon as we crossed into Wyoming we started to see Pronghorn.  I have always loved how delicate they look.   We met relatives in Rawlins WY for breakfast.  That day was the windiest day I have ever seen/felt/tried to walk in.  We had a great breakfast at Rochelle Ranch Golf Course.  My mom's cousin and her daughter told us info about the course and the general area.  We made it to Casper WY.  We stayed at Fort Caspar RV Park.  It supposedly was an historic area, but we didn't see any of that.  We got a great rate with our Passport America discount - but it was just a huge gravel parking lot with some very old trailers.  We didn't care and didn't even unhook the truck.  We took a short walk on a trail and found a geocache and called it a day.

Black Thunder Coal Mine
Largest surface coal mine in North America

Mon 6/11/2012   This is the last leg of our journey to Rapid City SD.  Soon after leaving Casper we were driving through the Thunder Basin National Grasslands.  It consists of approximately 550,000 acres of rolling grassland that is home to birds and herds of Antelope. No spectacular scenery - but still it's very impressive.  Also in that area is the Black Thunder Coal Mine - the largest surface coal mine in the US.  A lot of the operation is close to the highway so we could see the huge dump trucks.  We wished we would've had time to check on taking a tour - it would've been fascinating. 


We had to have a couple of fittings replaced for the hot water tank.  Luckily we found an RV repair shop that was able to fix it immediately and didn't charge us much.  We made it to America's Mailbox and got everything set up to spend the night there and prepare ourselves to become  South Dakota residents.

WOW---What a grand land we live in!!!

Red Canyon

Randy Hiking Red Canyon Trail



Slot Canyon

 

06 June 2012
Headed to Bryce Canyon today such a beautiful place. First stop was Red Canyon then onto Bryce. When we stopped at the Visitor Center to get our obligitory magnet for our collection we saw this post card with a slot canyon on it so I asked where in the park it was located. Navajo Loop. We drove up to our first of 14 stops within the park and Navajo Loop was located here. So I got brave and hiked down to the very bottom of the valley floor I went from 8100 ft down to about 6800 feet into this beautiful slot canyon. My butt was dragging when I got back to the top. It was well worth the workout!!!  We spent about 3 hours within the park stopping at every vista. The weather was the coolest we've been in for the last 4 weeks it was a very comfortable 68 compared to the 90-100+  we've been in. From Bryce we decided to head into Zion as it was close to where we are staying at in Kanab UT. We were at Zion a couple of years ago with our entire family. One of the things we noticed between the two national parks is that at Bryce you are looking down at the beauty and in Zion you are looking up to the beauty.
I wound up taking 282 pictures and Peg took 261 pictures. Enjoy the pictures. Mother Nature is Awesome!!! Red Canyon-Bryce-Zion Pictures

Natural Bridge

Inspiration Point

The Grand Canyon North Rim at Sunrise

There are no words...

Link to Pictures:  The Grand Canyon North Rim at Sunrise

Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park - Kanab UT



Are we lost yet???

If we were off-road enthusiasts, we would consider this state park heaven!  There are over 1200 acres of sand dunes for off-roaders to ride.  The State Park was created to keep the landscape and users safe.
The sand is extremely fine and a beautiful shade of coppery coral...I don't see it as pink.  I found it difficult to walk in it was so deep and fine.  Randy did a great job of climbing a couple of dunes to get some great pictures.

Pipe Spring National Monument

We saw the signs for Pipe Spring National Monument on our way to Kanab UT and decided we needed a break.  If I didn’t have the National Parks pass for seniors and could get in free, we probably wouldn’t have gone any further than the visitor center.  This turned out to be an interesting place to visit
.
We were just in time for a ½ hr. guided tour of “Winsor Castle” and the chance to hear some interesting bits of history.  Pipe Spring was an early Mormon outpost called a tithing ranch -  A place to raise the cattle that were tithed to the Mormon Church.  This ranch provided butter and cheese to workers building the Mormon temple in St. George UT – a four day trip away.  It also became a safe haven for Mormon polygamous wives to hide from federal authorities.  The first telegraph office in Arizona was established here.

In addition to the history and a very interesting talk by the ranger, I enjoyed the architecture of the buildings. 

Snow Canyon State Park - St. George UT

When we took our Sunday Drive, we discovered we were passing through a relatively new Utah State Park called Snow Canyon – just on the outskirts of St. George.  We had some time after the tournament was over Friday and decided that a nice cool air conditioned drive was in order.

We came in through the south entrance that is right in St. George UT.  Even though the temperatures were close to 100, it looked like a lot of people were going for bike rides in the park.  The map we received listed the various trails and a short description of them. 

We chose one called “Jenny’s Canyon”.  It was only .5 mi round trip and easy enough for children (sounded like something I could do).  The other part I thought sounded interesting was the destination a “slot canyon”.  This was a great little hike.  The slot canyon was cool to walk into and we got some great pictures.

We stopped by the Visitors Center at the park.  I really wanted to take a good look at this beautiful building.  It seemed a little more modern southwestern design.  Even the colors were fantastic.

 

Mesquite Musings

We left Mesquite NV yesterday after spending 8 days there for the Mesquite Amateur Golf Tournament.  My exposure to the area was mainly limited to the RV Park and Casa Blanca Casino.  Randy of course concentrated on the golf courses.

Since we were spending so much time there I decided it deserved a blog entry.  I kept my eyes open for cool things to take pictures of and things to do that were interesting – there weren’t many.

I saw the huge Oasis Casino complex – hotel, casino, parking garage…empty for several years now.  There was the Convention Center – also huge and vacant.  Even the Visitors Center was boarded up.  I think we mainly traveled through the old part of town, so the abandoned buildings were to be expected.  

There were many abandoned recent projects also – golf courses, casinos, housing developments and RV parks.  All started and then stopped due to the economy.

We discovered an excellent Chinese Restaurant on our last night there…the Panda Garden.  The RV Park we stayed at was wonderful…nice pool, laundry room and activities.  But with temperatures averaging 100+ degrees every day, we didn’t do much exploring in town.  There’s the Wal Mart and a mall and strip malls – not much else. 

As we were packing up to leave, a friendly guy on his way to the pool stopped to chat with us.  He mentioned that he was originally from Anacortes WA.  He and his wife had traveled full-time in an RV for about 6 years – like we are doing.  They ended up buying a park model at this complex.  He told us some interesting places we shouldn’t miss in our travels.

As I started to write this blog, I wished I would’ve asked him why he chose to live in Mesquite.  He’s retired, he traveled to many places that he could’ve chosen….Why Mesquite?  I’ll never know.