SNOW?????????????

I suppose that is the final indignity when you come here just as their season opens. I overheard a conversation in which snow was mentioned in a town 30 miles away.
Sure enough, a few hours later I was in a flurry. Fortunately, the guardian angels did their thing and the skies cleared.

The 90-mile long Flaming Gorge reservoir was formed by building the Flaming Gorge Dam:

Behind the dam, the lake stretches its sinuous way North.

Driving North on a great sweeping road, I stopped (between snow flurries) at some sublime overlooks. One of the most impressive is that at Red Canyon:

There is a promontory between that view and this next one, so it won't all go in one big panorama. I hate falling from great heights.

Yes, a pair of speedboats were cruising down the Green River as it flows Southward toward where I was in my last post. After taking that shot, I headed North on the highway toward where the snow had been reported. I did take a couple of videos, but they are too depressing to show.

Instead, here's a view from a mountain about 30 miles North of Red Canyon:

As you see in some of these, I was really dodging clouds looking for any breaks to get some color in the images,

Just stepped outside to look at the new day, and saw--clouds. Sigh. At least there's no snow yet...

Little Wild Horse Canyon-only for the slender...

Little Wild Horse Canyon is a slot canyon somewhat like those in Page, Arizona and Kanab in Utah. Right off--if you are not slender, don't come here. These are REALLY narrow slots!

I protected my cameras and tripod at all costs, and staggered out with blood leaking from both arms and legs. I haven't gotten this beaten up since Havasupai! Still, it was worth every ding--I'm going to love processing hundreds of these subtly-hued pictures!

Eventually, one emerges from the slots into beautiful wide portions of the canyon: The Sun pours down and the rocky walls soar up into the sky above you.

Little Wild Horse Canyon is only five miles from Goblin Valley, so I went back to photograph a few formations, such as these giant chess men near the entrance:

This entire area is filled with large formations, some like these right by the side of the road near Hanksville.

.The long drive home is tomorrow. The pictures I've put on the blog these past few days are just a few I grabbed on first scanning through 40 gigabytes of material. Now I can sit happily in the airco during the Vegas Summer and play for hours and hours with goblins and ethereally-colored slots.

Home in one piece. I think.

Delighted to be home, though the drive across Utah today was spectacular. The weather broke at a crucial moment, and I got some good shots I haven't processed yet.

For a treat, though, how about some flying lawnmower videos? This was the one morning when the Sun really came out, and there were lawnmowers everywhere!

That fabulous scene may have you wondering--but what the heck do you do after two or three hours when you want to land? It turns out that gusty winds really blow these things around, and landing them is an art.

The experienced pilots make it look easy, but after watching some students make several unsuccessful attempts, I have a great respect for these men.

60 Gigabytes of data to process, but I look forward to every one!

Mother always said there'd be days like this...

Yesterday was a sensational day--a deep blue sky for the drive from Escalante and a perfect afternoon for an initial foray into the park. I should have known that Mother Nature was luring me in.

Filled with confidence after that afternoon, I decided to undertake the arduous 70-mile circuit up to Cathedral Valley. That was my main target when I set up the trip.

So, the Toyota and I took off for the river ford--oh, did I forget to tell you that you have to cross the river to get to the North? Must have slipped my mind.

All went well for a couple of hours. The light was brilliant at the South Cathedral Valley overlook.

Alas, then the clouds roared in, the rains came, and I drove fifty miles of rutted, bouncy, rocky, treacherously twisting roads and took nary a picture. Well, when I got back to my starting point a bit of late afternoon sun bathed the hills above the park entrance--just to mock me. Grrrrr. Note the sky in the image below compared to the one above, taken this morning.



Of course, after that unintended 'scouting mission' I know where all the Cathedral Valley formations are now, so I can just do the whole thing again tomorrow or Sunday.

Of course, when I turn the car toward the river, she is going to look at me with those big, soulful headlights and roll over dead.

There are two posts today...

There were so many attractions today that I had to break the blog into two posts. these early pictures are from the punishing but beautiful drive from Escalante to the famed Hole in the Rock--which I'll show in the second post below this one. The road gets worse the closer we get to the Hole in the wall. And worse.And, as we get within a few miles of the Hole in the Rock, beyond worse. All along the road, we have to the West a massive escarpment, which obviously guided the trail the Mormon wagon train followed.

Along the way, we stopped at the Devil's Garden, a huge collection of strangely-shaped sandstone monoliths, arranged as a giant child would play with blocks. Nature shows a weird sense of humor here!

Then we arrived at Dance Hall Rock--this place is huge, a monster amphitheater in which the wagon train Mormons had their Saturday night festivities. Mormons had a lot of children. I'll move on.
Throughout the punishing drive even for his 4-wheel drive,, my guide Sean showed me places where the wheels of the 1879 wagon train to the Hole in the Rock left their marks. He was also expert at finding Indian arrowheads and other small traces of Indian habitation. The picture below is of 130-year-old wagon ruts!



It was a punishing but fabulous day. Please scroll down to the next post to see the Hole in the rock itself--an astonishing story of human spirit that would not be beaten.

Nothing could be as dramatic as yesterday. Oh, wait...

Yesterday my Kodachrome Basin adventure ended with a climb up to Angel's Palace overlook, which as you see is crisscrossed with trails--I, of course, had to go to the highest. No remarks.

Then, this morning I stopped at Tropic Ditch, outside of Bryce Canyon, for a spot of morning hoodoos in the early sunlight.

This is along what they call here the Most Beautiful Drive in America. I'm down by the highway looking up toward High Point, the Red formation top left.

This is the view from up on High Point. I drove to my left from here. came into the picture in that row of trees on the right, and drove on down toward Escalante. I'm in a motel there for three nights.

And why come to Escalante? Among other attractions, this is the Lower Calf Creek Falls. It is a five mile killer hike, but the falls are beautiful when you get there!