Canyonlands National Park…

We claimed an early start for Canyonlands National Park, largely due to it being referred to in most travel guides as one of the most dramatic and magnificent of Utah’s National Parks. We breakfasted next to the now rather placid and calm Colorado River (which also, possibly due to wind on the surface, bizarrely appeared to be flowing in the opposite direction to the previous night?!), before making our way past Wilson Arch towards The Needles – one of the three main areas in this vast park.

We took in the once-again informative visitor’s centre and aimed to do a couple of places in this section before lunch, including Wooden Shoe Arch and Pothole Point. The vistas and views on this route were initially quite cool, with crazy rock formations and dramatic cliffs, a couple of arches, several walls covered in ancient painted pictographs and etched petroglyphs [enjoy the photo of the hilarious sign next to said ‘defaced’ rocks], and various rivers carving their way into the ground.

However, it gradually gave way to more of the same (basically lots of massive rocks), and given the general vastness of Canyonlands we opted to make the morning session in The Needles a whistle-stop tour, quickly racing back towards Moab for lunch and fuel before heading towards the altogether more appealing Island in the Sky section of Canyonlands.

First port of call in this second section was the Shafer Canyon Overlook [see above], revealing a phenomenal canyon with vertiginous edges (plus attached side-canyons) that appeared to roll away as far as the eye could see. We paused for several photos, naturally, and were able to trace a precarious-looking trail down from the rim to the floor of the canyon [see below], before clambering over a few large rocks as all young and intrepid travelling explorers should.

Whilst continuing our journey through the park, the sunscreen amusingly exploded in Adam’s lap, and in the resulting chaos (that included a casual half-lane swerve) our flimsy park map somehow found its way out of the window. As I pulled in to the car park for Mesa Arch, having annoyingly had a white vehicle sat on my tail for the preceding couple of miles whilst dabbling with apex-clipping lane changes (all safely executed in the name of economical motoring, I might add), I was perplexed to be followed in by the white vehicle.

Consequently we realised this white vehicle also possessed a set of flashing red and blue lights – how long they were on for we had failed to notice – and, more worryingly, an enforcement outfit attired individual was making his way over to my window. I frantically searched for my licence and other papers, all but defecating in fear of the inevitable interrogation, reckless driving fine, licence removal, and deportation from the US (things escalate in your mind rather rapidly in such situations). Strange how things pan out, but here’s a rough account of the ensuing dialogue:

Myself: Afternoon, sir.

Ranger: (sternly) You got your park map on you?

Myself: Nope, it flew out the window when the sunscreen exploded.

Ranger: (politely) Ah, ok. No worries. Just checking people weren’t littering out of their vehicle windows. Enjoy the park.

Bloody ridiculous, if you ask me. Still, the term ‘relieved’ sprang to mind.

Anyways, we hopped along the trail to Mesa Arch [see above and below] which was spectacular and stunning and well worthy of the half hour stay and copious photographing that we subsequently inflicted. The arch itself, some thirty-plus feet wide, looked a smidge thin and unstable, but provided several remarkable photos that incorporated the arch itself with the sprawling canyon floor and vertical drops for a background.

We hit the road once more down towards the Grand View Point Overlook and nearby rim walk – a lengthy trail that turned out to be one of the most memorable seen yet. It was simply phenomenal, with never ending views of canyon after canyon, the Colorado River (and the canyons it has carved), snow-capped peaks in the distance, collapsing canyon cliff-faces, countless points where the trail touches the canyon edge (with 200ft falls beneath), innumerable spikes, needles and buttes, and so on. Below should be a few of the many photos we took on this trail.

We raced back to Moab for the basketball final, sadly skipping past Dead Horse Point State Park, a landscape very similar to that of Canyonlands and one that has been used for the opening scene of Mission: Impossible II (where Tom Cruise completely believably free-climbs a butte) and the iconic final scene (amongst others) of early 90s road movie, Thelma & Louise [click respectively for youtube links to both].

Back in Moab – one of the few relatively liberal and therefore lively towns in the Mormon-influenced otherwise uneventful state of Utah – we enjoyed a few beverages in the company of the basketball and some charming bar girls, before eventually traipsing back to our campsite under a clear and star-filled sky.

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