BOONDOCKING IN ZION

BOONDOCKING / DRY CAMPING

Our friend Sue ( http://rvsueandcrew.com/ )  is a boondocker.  That is she doesn't have to plug into power because she carries her power with her! She has a very large solar panel attached to her Cargo type van that supplies all the power she needs to run her TV, her computer, her lights and some to spare. This means Sue doesn't have a need for campgrounds. She camps on BLM land, or Forest Service land for free! She can camp on any one space for up to 14 days, then it's time to move on.

Sue is coming here to visit. Yesterday was our day off. We are trying to find suitable land for Sue to camp on here in Zion Canyon. Since this is gonna be hard work, we decided to go to our favorite town, Springdale UT (10 miles east of here) and have a late lunch!

Springdale is the home of Zion National Park! What a beautiful town! To your right is Wildcat Willie's! Our favorite place for yummy food! One of our favorites is the buffalo meatloaf! Yummy!

Everywhere you look in Springdale, you see amazing mountains!

The town is beautiful beyond words.  OK, enough scenery... on to the food!

Stuffed baked potatoes with a yummy chipotle sauce!

My new favorite, prickley pear margarita made with real cactus juice and mmm mmm good!

Lots of local beers made around here too.... this is Chuck's quest... to flavor test all the local beers to find his favorite! So far, Cutthroat Beer is his favorite!

The buffalo wings at Wildcat Willie's are to die for! We are so addicted that we ate more than 1/2 before I remembered to take a picture!

If you look closely, you can see Chuck and I reflected in the window!

FINDING SUE A PLACE TO CAMP

We had heard there was some good camping areas on the road to Grafton! We turned at Rockville and headed towards Grafton. (Grafton area is where much of the movie "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" was shot! Remember the bicycle riding scene??? Shot in front of the old school house/ church in Grafton! The road to Grafton is beautiful!

 Scenery peeking through the bluffs and buttes....

Here, we took a left turn off the Grafton road as we saw some possible off road camping sites!

Then we see this sign! 1/2 mile on either side of the road usually means a steep drop off! In AZ they want you close to the road, right?  We found several campsites that folks had used just off the road that would be perfect!

 Good roads and beautiful scenery so far. so we kept going hunting for that perfect spot for Sue! But the paved road left and the rough dirt roads began....

But the scenery continued as awesome!

We found several campsites up ahead, and after using 4WD and one steep climb up a sorta rocky road, and seeing another steep road ahead, I decided we were gonna turn around! The road wasn't real bad, just more than I was in the mood for!

So we decided to head on to Grafton.  There was a sign almost immediately that said no camping beyond here....  Sorry Sue, but the road is beautiful and worth the drive!

We had to laugh at this sign. There was a small community down the hill, so I am sure they had their share of dust from folks heading to Grafton!

The road dead ends at Grafton... it is such a visual journey that we highly recommend you take it.  I will show more about Grafton in my next post, but this post is to show off the scenery in the area and find RVSue a campground!
We got back up to the highway (Highway 9) in Rockville and turned left.

THE ALMOST PERFECT SPOT!

 The reason I say "almost perfect", if you see behind the tent you will see a tour bus and behind the tour bus, another car. That is highway 9! But BUT BUT BUT SUE!!!! THIS IS THE BEST WE COULD FIND!

Nice dirt roads with several good camp sites. There were 3 occupied tent sites when we were here.

 The best campsite was up under that tree, but a tenter already claimed it!

There was even a hiking trail out of this camp area..
this area is known as Coalpits Wash!

 Another good campsite!

And another possibility....

AND NO RUTTED ROADS THERE! Several of the roads where we went looking for campsites were almost impassible without a high clearance 4WD vehicle! Coalpits road might have been near the highway, but most of the camp areas were a bit away from it and the road in and out was easy access.

Ok Sue, and everybody else interested.... here you see some choice as to where you can camp for free near Zion! Most are not easy to get to but the rides to find them are amazing journeys into beautiful wild country! And there is always Wildcat Willies at the end of the day! :-)

Hope you enjoyed the roadtrip with us! Happy Trails from the MotherShip and her crew... Chuck, Geri and the hound herd Scotty, DoogieBowser and Radar!

Zion Utah

ZION UTAH!

BEAUTIFUL WILD COUNTRY

When Chuck and I arrived here 3 weeks ago, we were busy learning our jobs and meeting new people. The routine has become much easier and we workamp with a bunch of wonderful folks here!

Zion River RV Resort is a beautiful 5 star RV resort on the Virgin River, we have green grass and large level sites here.

There are also some very nice tent camping areas.

BEAUTIFUL SCENERY TOO!

This is one of the dirt roads just west of Virgin Utah, headed to the LaVerkin Overlook.

The Virgin River cuts a deep gorge into the earth and it can be seen starting here. As you drive through the town of LaVerkin and go over the bridge, you can easily see how deep this gorge becomes and how beautiful!

Looking west towards the town of LaVerkin. The colors and textures of the EarthMother around here are totally amazing! I haven't really begun to photograph the area yet! I promise you I will!

Above is highway 9 that eventually takes you to Virgin Utah, Springdale Utah and Zion National Park.
This was taken looking east.

DOGGIE ART!

After coming back from car rides....  I had lots of "doggie art" on my back windows to wash off!

One day while Chuck and I were sitting outside reading our Kindles, a humming bird went flying by!
Well hey! What the heck!??! I went right into town and bought a hummingbird feeder and now we have tons of hummers all doing flyby acrobatics and war combat to fight over who gets to the feeders first! Fun entertainment!

AMAZING LANDSCAPES AND SUNSETS

Whenever Chuck and I leave for a new adventure, the excitement builds in my tummy, the hound herd is bouncing around our heels, the MotherShip is packed and we are ready to meet the highway ahead!
Today, I read this poem  from The Hobbit, it perfectly describes what life has become for us!
Hope you enjoy it!
******************************************
The Greatest Adventure, The Ballad of The Hobbit
From the animated movie The Hobbit

The greatest adventure is what lies ahead.
Today and tomorrow are yet to be said.
The chances, the changes are all yours to make.
The mold of your life is in your hands to break.

The greatest adventure is there if you're bold.
Let go of the moment that life makes you hold.
To measure the meaning can make you delay;
It's time you stop thinkin' and wasting the day.

The man who's a dreamer and never takes leave
Who thinks of a world that is just make-believe
Will never know passion, will never know pain.
Who sits by the window will one day see rain.

The greatest adventure is what lies ahead.
Today and tomorrow are yet to be said.
The chances, the changes are all yours to make.
The mold of your life is in your hands to break.

The greatest adventure is what lies ahead!
*******************************************

Happy trails to you from the crew of the MotherShip and our hound herd! Chuck,pilot - Geri, co-pilot - and our navigators - Scotty, DoogieBowser and Radar!

Oh No! SNOW!

OLD MAN WINTER AIN'T GIVING UP!

This is inside of my SUV window, as I reached in to get my camera... as soon as the snow hit the windshield, it melted!

But the SNOW was falling...

This view of the SNOW also shows the new box Chuck had built by The Iron Man in Elephant Butte NM.  It holds our generator and fuel. More photos/news about this box later in another blog!

Me, covered in snowflakes after going outside to take pictures! LOL!

I took one last photo through the open door of The MotherShip!

The snow turned to rain, and now that too has stopped, but the skies are heavy above so I expect more of the same any time.  Looks like the campers are all staying inside their rigs today! Brrrr!

On the Road to Lee's Ferry and Utah

THURSDAY APRIL 5 2012
DAY ONE

We are not real proud of this, but somehow we got our starting dates mixed up! We were thinking we were to begin at Zion River RV Resort on May 1st. Not so! Tuesday, our new boss, Mason, called wanting to know where we were! We were due there April 1st NOT May 1st.  Well, as things worked out, we would not have been able to make it April 1st even if we had the date right in our minds, the MotherShip was still waiting on the factory to send one last piece so the repairs could be completed on her grey tanks!  First the factory sent the wrong tanks, those had to be returned and wait for tne new ones to arrive! Finally when the new ones arrived, they were also the wrong ones but they could be adapted to fit, but it meant 2 more weeks before the factory sent the right valves. So we decided while we were waiting for parts, to get a box welded on the back of the MotherShip to carry our generator and LP gas tanks. Chuck had the generator converted to LP several years ago because we don't want to carry around gasoline!

We left T or C on Thursday, after 2 mad days of packing like crazy! We had just gotten the MotherShip back on Monday... Tuesday we got the call from Mason that we were long over due... so yesterday we left about 11am with the bed just loaded down with everything that would pile on the bed! We drove I-25N to Socorro and turned West on Highway 60... a beautiful drive through hills and mountains and small towns like Magdalina and Pie Town and slipped into Arizona about 3pm and are now camped in Springerville. Tonight we plan to be in Flagstaff, tomorrow night at Lee's Ferry and into Zion on Easter Sunday!

There won't be too many photos, I am also driving my TrailBlazer up... It costs a lot less to run around for 6 months in my TB than 6 months in Chuck's "Beastie" V-10 Ford dually! Besides...  we have sold both saddles to a place in Utah and needed the room in my SUV to carry them! The price of the saddles will more than cover the cost of extra gas used. BUT there will be photos a few sentences down taken at the beautiful Lee's Ferry on 89A in AZ,

FRIDAY APRIL 6 2012

DAY 2

We spent Thursday night in Flagstaff. Nothing exciting to report there! We stayed at the Greer RV Park on highway 89 heading out of town. We drove 3 hours north on 89, a lot of holiday traffic on that 2 lane road, but they have passing lanes every few miles so the traffic doesn't get backed up too bad!

SATURDAY APRIL 6 2012

DAY 3

After leaving Flagstaff, we followed highway 89 North until we came to the Page/Lake Powell turn-off. We took the left hand turn Highway 89A and the scenery just exploded! It was amazing! We turned right at Marble Canyon and headed down to Lee's Ferry. The campground is boondocking only and with a senior pass $6 a night! You are camped up on a bluff overlooking the Colorado River in the most amazing Canyon!

 This was at the entrance to Lee's Ferry. A lot of rafting tours take off from here headed for the Grand Canyon!

 The color of the rocks is amazing! Layers of colors!

 Chuck walking the hound Herd before we head into the park!

 There will be interesting balancing rocks along the way. Last year Chuck and I posed under this very rock with plenty of headroom to spare!

 Our campsite overlooks the Colorado River... to the right of that tree! Not bad for $6 a night! We intend to stop here on the way back when we have time to spend several days! It was a bit crowded, but not full. You must remember, this was Easter weekend!

 Sitting from the campground picnic table, we had a great unobstructed view of the canyon and the river!
Great sunset colors reflecting on the canyon walls!

 Campground at sunrise.....

 The hiking trail from the campground down to the river! To see more about Lee's Ferry... here is a link to the blog from our 2010 visit!http://www.phunnyfarm.blogspot.com/2010/10/lees-ferry-az.html

One last photo on our way out of Lee's Ferry this morning! 3 hours later we arrived in Virgin Utah at our workamping job with Zion River RV Resort.

www.ZionRiverResort.com   We will be working here for 6 months, until October!  I will get busy and take some photos of the park, but that link above will show you much of the park! 

We did notice as we passed the Grand Canyon North Rim on Highway 89A, that it is still closed for the winter. That is one steep ride up to Jacob's Lake where you turn to go into the park! But it was a beautiful ride!!! 

Well, that's it for now, just wanted you to know we arrived in Zion safe and sound!

Happy Trails!

Geri, Chuck and the Hound Herd!