November 13, 2020.  We found a nice boondocking spot in the Coconino forest just north of Flagstaff.  It was quiet and peaceful with a night sky full of stars.  That’s the good news.  The bad news is that we drove several miles over very badly rutted dirt road to get there.  Leroy was tilting to the right while Harvey was tilting to the left.  We had to jockey back and forth between pine trees (dry branches snapping off right and left as we passed) to back into a level spot. I had to clean out my drawers when we finally got parked.  On our way back out we actually drove cross-country for a short distance to avoid a really bad spot in the road.  This is a problem. To find peace and quiet we have to go where no one in their right minds will go.

The main reason for stopping there was to re-provision in Flagstaff, but since it was so peaceful and we had such a time getting parked, we decided to have a look around.  We knew there were a couple of old volcanos up the road but what we didn’t know was that there were also tons of Anasazi ruins!

We first drove through the Sunset Crater Volcano National Monument. We stopped at the first turnout and hiked 1.5 miles straight up the side of the Lenox Crater to look into the crater.  It was underwhelming. It was a big hole filled with pebble-sized volcanic rock with a few struggling juniper bushes.  The same stuff that we slogged through on the side of the volcano to get to the rim.  We should have saved our energy for hiking around the Anasazi ruins.  

Before leaving the volcanos, we enjoyed a panoramic view of the Painted Desert.  We could see everywhere we had been: Lee’s Ferry, Grand Canyon, and Monument Valley.  It was hazy and the pictures didn’t come out, so I won’t waste bandwidth on them. 

The first ruin we came to was the Wukoki Pueblo.  The sign said these people lived here circa 1120-1210 CE. It was an amazing structure, once three stories tall, built of stones and clay mortar on top of a huge rock. 

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Next was the Wupatki Pueblo.  This one had a pueblo with many, many rooms, again built atop a large rock.  Features of the rock were cleverly incorporated into the rooms.  There were also two large, circular foundations that must have been community gathering places.  The tower of the Wukoki Pueblo was visible in the distance and we suppose that signals could be sent and received.

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Around the corner and a few miles further we came to two pueblos.  One small one with about five rooms was called Nalakihu Pueblo.  It sat at the foot of the hill below the Citadel Pueblo.  On the other side of the Citadel was a deep crater that was probably left over from a volcano.  The Citidel is so far the only ruin we have seen that incorporates lava rocks, along with odd-shaped rocks and stones.  The others have all been built of the flat, red rock that looks like bricks.  The only part standing in the Citadel was the lower portion of the outer walls. The sign said it may have been two or three stories tall with many rooms inside.  Inside was only a pile of stones so we couldn’t tell about the rooms.

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Finally we came to the Box Canyon Dwellings (one on each side of a box canyon) and the Lomaki Pueblo.  We were getting tired by this time so we only hiked to the nearest Box Canyon Dwelling and took pictures of the other two from there.  The sign said there were many ruins all over this valley so we started looking around as we were driving out and we did see them everywhere!  Once you know what to look for.  If we had it to do over, we would replace the hike up the volcano with some cross-country trekking to look at some ruins that were NOT on their maps and lists.

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November 13, 2020.  On the advice of friends, Deryle and Wanda, we doubled back to Tuba City to see the dinosaur tracks.  It was only about 15 miles and one doesn’t see dinosaur tracks every day, so what the hey?

They were marked by one tiny sign that we nearly missed.  Must be why we blew right past the first time through on the way to Lee’s Ferry.  Navajo are apparently not good at shameless self-promotion.  

We were treated to a guided tour by a nice Navajo woman.  She brushed off the tracks and sprinkled them with water so they would show up better in the photos.  She named each dinosaur and told us how big it was and what it ate.  She showed us some big, roundish, dark rocks that she claimed were dinosaur poop.  I don’t know how this is known, just gonna leave it right here.  There were also some petrified bones and eggs.  Very cool.

We bought some jewelry from the lady, gave her a tip and continued on our way south.

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November 14, 2020. The North Rim is closed for winter so we headed for the South Rim from Lee’s Ferry.  Turns out the east entrance to the South Rim on Hwy 64 is closed and has been all summer.  The Navajo Nation does not want the traffic, apparently. It’s about 250 miles to go around to the west entrance because you have to go all the way down to Flagstaff and back up again.  

Being clever, we found some boondocking spots just off of Hwy 64 on FR307 (fire road) in the Kaibab National Forest.  With a combo of maps, google satellite, and iOverlander (boondocking app), we determined that by following FR 307 we could get through to Hwy 64 somewhere in the middle of the Grand Canyon South Rim.  We also reasoned that it would be nice and quiet boondocking there.  No traffic (road closed), sneak in the back way, et voila, cross off Grand Canyon!

Ha!  FR 307 is a nightmare of washboard gravel. We went 2 miles pulling Harvey and stopped at the second boondocking spot we came to.  Along this backroad ran a steady stream of trucks, a few cars, and a couple of dirt buggies.  Wtf?  Turns out the Navajos go up there to get firewood.  There are no trees down where they live!

We took off early next morning to sneak in the back way, hoping the washboard gravel would turn to dirt with merely rocks and potholes.  It never did.  Fifteen miles and 1.5 hours later we did indeed emerge onto the canyon rim road!  Aren’t we the clever ones?  We drove down to the east entrance (noticed that only those orange/white cylindrical barrel things were blocking the exit—you know where this is going, right?) took some great pictures and made our way back to the west entrance, stopping at every pullout on the way.  We have oodles of pictures from multiple angles.  I’ll try to narrow it down to only the best/most interesting. 

After arriving at the west gate things got really crowded.  We parked Leroy and got out the bikes, rode around right past a couple of grazing elk, took some more pictures and then got lost trying to find Leroy again.  It was getting late (about 4:30) and cold and we still had to go back over 15 miles of washboard road (now in the dark).

Once we found Leroy (phew!), we had the bright idea to hightail it the 30 miles back to the east entrance, move the orange cylinders (hoping they weren’t filled with sand—they weren’t) and make a break for it.  The east entrance was only 10 miles (on pavement!) from where we parked Harvey.

Just as we got to the barriers a white, forest service van came out from the entrance.  We waited for him to disappear down the road and I told Alan to just go in where he came out.  Alan says we’d be going the wrong way.  I said, “so what, the road is closed!”  So he did.  And just then another white, forest service vehicle came directly toward us!  Oh s#*t!  Busted!  We backed out thinking we were going to get a stern lecture at the very least but the guy just looked at us and kept going.  Whereupon I jumped out, moved four of the barrels, Alan drove through, I replaced the barriers, jumped in the truck and shouted, “GO”.  And we did.  We blew past the entrance where there were two MORE forest service vehicles.  We couldn’t tell whether or not they were occupied, just kept going.  Alan was watching the rear-view mirror thinking they were gonna come after us.  They didn’t but we had another 5 miles to go before getting out of the park.  We came around a corner and there was a closed gate!!!  Would we have to go back past the entrance and the forest service folks (and then down 15 miles of washboard road in the dark)?  Is that why they didn’t bother following us? Crap.  But wait, there was someone at the gate!  A truck on the other side and two Navajo guys just closing the gate.  We pulled up and stopped.  They looked at us.  We looked at them.  They opened the gate.  We thanked them profusely and drove “home”.  Got here before dark!

What were those guys doing at the gate and how did they get it open?  It had a chain and, presumably a lock.  Did they think they were busted when we drove up?  Or do the Navajos have back door permissions?  We don’t know, we are just very grateful they were there.

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November 12, 2020.  Yesterday we arrived at Lee’s Ferry, AZ and we are staying at the campground here.  The north rim of the Grand Canyon is closed so this is as far as we will go.  Tomorrow we will backtrack and head for the south rim.  

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Lee’s Ferry was the only crossing of the Colorado River for 600 miles in either direction.  In 1927, the ferry was replaced with the Navajo Bridge. The bridge is narrow and not built for heavy loads so another bridge was built right next to it in in 1995.  

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Lee’s Ferry is also the entry spot for rafting trips down the Grand Canyon.  We saw a couple of groups taking off while we were here.

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We haven’t seen much of Roger since leaving Moab but we have four bars here in the middle of nowhere.  Go figure.  

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November 11, 2020.  We intended to stay at the Navajo National Monument, but the Navajo Nation is in lockdown right now and everything is closed.  So we just cruised through, but the rock formations in Monument Valley were stunning.

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November 7, 2020.  There was a big storm predicted so we decided to head further south. We didn’t make it very far and holed up at Recapture Reservoir, just north of Blandings, Utah.  We found a spot somewhat out of the wind and hunkered down.  In the space of 24 hours we had 50 knot wind gusts, rain, lightening, thunder, hail, sleet and snow, beginning just after parking Harvey.  It was a peaceful spot and we had the lake all to ourselves, except for at dawn on Monday and Wednesday mornings when a duck hunter fired off his shotgun at O-dark thirty.  That explains why the ducks were so skittish when I walked down to the lake. We also saw deer and heard coyotes while here. 

We were hoping it would snow enough that we could go skiing but it was not to be.  Instead, we went up to Bridges National Monument.  What’s the difference between a bridge and an arch, we wondered?  We had it all worked out: the arches are carved out in a higher, sandstone layer whereas the bridges are carved out in a lower, older layer of rock.  True, but not the deal.  The deal is this: bridges are formed where water passes through in the canyon below.  A BRIDGE.  DUH!

There are three bridges and one overlook where we hiked down to see the ruins of some ancient cliff dwellings.  The cliff dwellings were on the other side of the canyon, a long way off.

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Coming back from Bridges, we stopped at some reconstructed Anasazi ruins.  

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October 5, 2020.  We headed south to check out the Needles, the section of Canyonland south of the Colorado River.  On the way, we passed Wilson Arch on Hwy 191 and then Newspaper Rock on Hwy 211.  This rock has the most petroglyphs we have yet seen in one place, but not all are old. 

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We found a spot to boondock just south of the park entrance near Hamburger Rock.  Our camping spot was unremarkable, next to Indian Creek which had no water.  This place was truly out in the boondocks, yet we had what seemed like a steady stream of four-wheelers (I call them dirt buggies) and dirt bikes.  Who knew?

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All the rocks around here look like hamburgers or ice cream cones, except the ones called the Needles. We propose to call those French Fries instead and the entire south section can be Dairy Queen. 

The first thing we encountered upon entering the park was an ancient food storage cache built under a cliff overhang. 

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Next we hiked around some cliff overhangs where there is a year-round spring; a hot commodity in these parts.  There are remnants of an old cowboy camp and supposedly more ancient evidence of dwellings. The park signs said that there were some ancient paintings but I went back and forth three times and could not find them. I did see some indentations in a large, flat rock that “could” have been from made grinding corn.

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We proceeded on to the “Needles” (aka french fries).  We couldn’t get close to these guys short of hiking a 10 mile trail (not!), so what you have here is our closest approach after a short hike from the road. 

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Upon returning from that hike I was standing at the truck shaking the sand out of my moccasins when I heard a big flapping noise right at my ear.  I turned and a raven had landed on the door not six inches from my head!  So, I gave him a cracker.  Then his mate flew up and I gave them both some crackers. On we went to the next overlook with more hamburgers.  Those two ravens followed our truck!!!

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Finally, we stopped at Wooden Shoe Arch on our way out.  Closest approach was still a long way off, but so cool!  Really marvelous in every direction. Pictures really don’t do justice.

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November 3, 2020.

We moved Harvey to Ken’s Lake campground just south of Moab so we wouldn’t have to drive as far to visit Canyonland. We’ve got a nice little spot next to a creek. 

Canyonland is the area where the Green River dumps into the Colorado. Both rivers have gouged deep canyons in winding routes through the high desert. Much of it is inaccessible. There are three main sections: the Island in the Sky (north section between the Colorado and the Green rivers), the Mesa (west section between the Green and the Colorado), and the Needles (south of the Colorado).  The mesa is only accessible by trails from the Glen Canyon area.  We went to the Island in the Sky and, from here, we will head south to explore the Needles.

Just before the Island in the Sky is a state park called Dead Horse Point, where the views are magnificent.  The point is at the very end of a mesa with a very narrow neck. Legend has it that cowboys used to drive wild herds of horses through the neck where they built a “fence” of brush and rocks and whatever, trapping the animals on the point. We’re guessing there were a few casualties.

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After Dead Horse Point, we drove around Island in the Sky, checking out the viewpoints and hiking around some. Finally, we hiked half a mile to Mesa Arch. Looking through Mesa Arch one can see a rock formation called Washer Woman, along with a tower and other stuff. 

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October 30 & 31, 2020.

We spent two days exploring Arches National Park, driving back and forth from Onion Creek.  This park was filled with wonders. First, we came upon a rock formation called Park Place, because it looks like the skyline in New York City. 

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Around the corner from Park Place was the Three Gossips and Sheep Rock. 

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A little further down was Balanced Rock. We walked all the way around this rock to see it from every angle. 

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Next up was North and South Window arches and Tower Arch. We walked all around these also. 

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The finale on day one was a strenuous hike 1.5 miles uphill to Delicate Arch. This hike nearly did us in but it was worth it!

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At the bottom of the Delicate Arch trail was these petroglyphs. 

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On day two, we took a short hike to Sandstone Arch and Broken Arch, then a longer hike (about 2 miles) to Tunnel, Pine Tree and Landscape arches.  The trail continued on, straight up, for another 8 miles to some other arches, but we didn’t.  You’ve seen one arch, you’ve seen ‘em all!  Seriously, though, we’ve gone to the National Art Museum in DC and, after a couple of hours it’s, “Oh, there’s another Van Gogh.” Sensory overload.  At least in the museum we didn’t have to hike miles uphill to see another Monet!

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