Road to Torrey UT

We left Moab on June 18th on Highway 191 to Interstate 70 West. As you approach exit 149, this strange rock formation/upwelling appears!

I just had to do it in B & W and Color!

Certainly catches your attention doesn't it?

Good thing, because this alerts you to your exit to Highway 24 to Hanksville Utah! This is an amazing drive, if you have time.... take it! You won't be sorry!

 Beautiful Highway Vistas !

Unusual rock formations

Color of the earth constantly changing

More Beautiful highway vistas

This is near where you begin to enter Capitol Reef National Park. I am going to give you the link from last year to see how beautiful it is.
http://phunnyfarm.blogspot.com/2010/10/capitol-reef-utah.html
The highway goes right thru Capitol Reef, to Torrey. There is no charge, just get your camera ready and prepare to keep you jaw up off the floor! Amazing country!
Also, here is a link to some of last years photos of Torrey Utah so you can see why we love it so!
http://phunnyfarm.blogspot.com/2010/09/torrey-utah.html
This year we have discovered a new restaurant, The Capitol Reef Cafe and Inn. OMG! Young 21 year old chef who will knock your socks off with his amazing avacodo salsa and everything else! Huge breakfast burrito should be shared! Ribs are excellent! The Nacho appetizer will fill 2 folks easily and the nacho chips are home made and thin and crispy! Thom, if you are coming this way... don't stay at this inn... you will never make it out of the cafe! hahaha!  This Cafe is unique in the way it is built with petrified wood! The Inn looks pretty cool too!
Tomorrow we head out for 2 days at Goblin Valley...
sounds neat huh???
Happy Trails from The MotherShip and her crew, Chuck, Geri and the houn herd Scotty, DoogieBowser and Radar!

Potash Road, Moab UT

Paul and Diane had told us about Potash Road, just a bit north of Moab and the Colorado River a left turn off of Highway 191. Potash Road follows along the Colorado River and offers some fine examples of Rock Art, or Petroglyphs so I thought I would share some of these with you. Please feel free to click on to any image to enlarge it to full size so you can see the petroglyphs better!

The road was well marked with plenty of room to pull over. At first Chuck and I saw only the rock art that was above our heads in this photograph.. 

within minutes, we realized that the art extended down about 25 yards or more along the wall. 

 The rock drawings show up much better when drawn on "varnished" areas of rock. 

Varnish is a natural stain caused from rain washing the rocks and thin layers of minerals washing down and building up a natural stain, or varnish.

Here it is easier to see the varnished and unvarnished part of the rock wall. Over the years, much of the rock has fallen away and taking many petroglyphs down with it.

Again, as a reminder, if you want to click on the photo, you can see it full size. Some of the art is so old and very faint.

I thought the long line of people joining hands was pretty cool. I have never seen one similar.

I really need to get a book on the meanings of petroglyphs! I find this so interesting!

 We just bought a wonderful book all about Rock Art.
"Petroglyphs and Pictrographs of Utah" written and put together by Dr. Kenneth B. Castleton, M.D. The photographs are excellent and even shows photos taken of petroglyphs taken in the 1940's that are now underwater in Glen Canyon Dam area! Excellent book also on that is: "The Monkey Wrench Gang" by Edward Abbey.  
We hope you enjoyed the tour through the ages of rock art we found on Potash Road! We left the day after taking this road trip for Torrey Utah.

Happy Trails from The MotherShip Gang, Geri, Chuck and our hound herd Scottie, DoogieBowser and Radar!

Canyonlands National Park

CANYONLANDS NATIONAL PARK

We decided to go to Moab to visit our friends Paul and Diane Thibodeaux. If you remember we travelled together last year, from Spearfish SD, to Cody Wyoming, to Tetonia Idaho and we had a great time exploring with them! Well, they are now workamping in Moab and we decided we wanted to visit Canyonlands National Park too, and maybe Arches as well. Both are just a short distance from Moab! Paul and Diane are always fun to visit and they were only 4 hours away so off we went! The drive to Moab was views of snow capped mountains and red rock formations! We got to their campground on the Colorado River and just caught up for the first few days. It had been several months since we had seen each other.  They had to go to work, so Chuck and I took off exploring. We decided on a twofer, Dead Horse Point State Park and Canyonlands were on the same road just a short distance from Moab. 

Highway 191 north out of Moab, is as interesting as the drive to and thru Canyonlands NP!

Merrimack and Monitor Formations

Click on image to read... this formation was on the road into the park.

A couple of old juniper?cedar? trees.

Dead Horse Point State Park,

complete with a raven to greet us!

All I can do here is share my images! It was beautiful!

This is where the Colorado and the Green River flow.

After Dead Horse Point, Chuck drove on the few more miles to Canyonlands National Park. If you have your "Geezer" card (Golden Age Pass) you get in free!

 Off on the side of the road, cacti blooming 

in yellows and magentas!

The Canyons were amazing! I have never seen anything like this. The Grand Canyon is amazing also, but very different from what we are seeing here.

 Plant Fossils in the rocks!

Click on to this image to see full size!

A beautiful view!

 By the time we made it back to the Merrimack and Monitor formations, storm clouds were building.

We have NO idea how this motor home got way up on that rock formation! Must be a road there somewhere that we missed! Click to enlarge!

Well, we didn't make it to Arches! But we will go back, Moab, Utah is a beautiful town!  We decided we wanted to go back to Torrey, Utah and this is where I sit now as I try to catch you up on our travels!  This is what Chuck and I do best, he drives, I take photographs and we know how blessed we are to be able to do this! We are also blessed to have you as friends and follow along with us!  Happy Trails!

Geri, Chuck, Scotty, DoogieBowser and Radar reporting from the MotherShip!