Tales from Towed Haul

April 15, 2015.  Exactly one year to the day from the start of our first serious Airstream adventure, we have hit the road again with Doris — this time celebrating her 98th dog birthday!  She is moving a little more tentatively these days, but still frightfully keen on camping.  Last year, we explored the national parks of Southern Utah (plus upper and lower routes there and back from Atlanta, for a total of about 5,000 miles).  This year we have selected a very different experience; taking a grand loop eastward across the Georgia plains, drifting up the coastal regions of South and North Carolina, hovering for a few days in the heart of Virginia where I went to college in the distant past, and ekeing spirally back down the Blue Ridge Parkway in the mountains of VA and NC.  These are areas Brad and I have traversed separately many times in our lives and that we want to see again from a new perspective and through the eyes of our aged dog.

We decided to leave a day earlier than planned, as it was raining in Atlanta and it seemed advisable to drop the tax return at the post office and just keep driving.  That meant we had to hustle to get all the last-minute things done 24 hours sooner, like wash all the dishes and laundry, shop for groceries, wash the Airstream inside and out, pack all of our worldly belongings into the customized storage bins, stabilize the house, run down to West Point with my sister to have lunch with Daddy who will be 102 next month (he was missing when we got there; we found him down by the creek wrestling wisteria vines off wax myrtles and generally cleaning up the creek bank — he was a little startled, but delighted to see me when I sneaked up and tapped him on the shoulder).  Last night we had a farewell dinner with our dear neighbor, Jennie, who is ultimately in charge.

We got out of town at about 10:30 this morning, and arrived at George L. Smith State Park in Twin City GA in early afternoon.  The park is named after George L. Smith II, who went to high school in nearby Swainsboro and served in the Georgia House of Representatives from 1959 until his untimely death in 1973.  It is a small but lovely state park in the middle of nowhere, surrounding a 450-acre-ish black-water pond that no one would ever dream of jumping into (even if it weren’t strictly prohibited).  The water is pitch black in color due to the tannic acid produced by the thousands of cypress trees growing out of the shallow water, eerily beautiful draped in Spanish moss and almost choking the lake from daylight.

When the rain subsided at about 6 pm, we took a damp but invigorating hike down to the Parrish Mill, a combination grist mill, saw mill, covered bridge and dam that was hand-constructed in 1880 and is still used today as a means of flood control in Emanuel County.  The black water from the pond washes lazily into the turbine at the top of the dam and gushes out below in what looks like a colossal accident involving Guinness Stout — yellowish white foam spewing out from the bridge, bobbing crazily and collecting along the river bank for as far as you can see.  Doris absolutely loved it, never having seen anything like that before.  They don’t allow her in the Olde Blind Dog Irish Pub near our farm, so she is generally unfamiliar with Guinness.  Even to our practiced eyes, it was a bit unexpected.

No TV tonight, as we are surrounded by trees (and probably other dark things that are between us and the three satellites that inform our DirectTV).   Looks like dinner and a mean game of competitive Canasta.

May 9, 2014.  The end!

This morning our ritual breaking of camp was bittersweet, marking the end of this perfect experiment in exploration, animal husbandry and basic survival (both mechanical and spiritual).  I expect those of you who have traveled this great county far more than I have are now realizing that I am, at the core, easily amused.  To me, there is something affirming in traversing 5,000 or so miles without leaving the ground.  Brad says it was like taking a peek backstage at America — seeing first-hand how so many people are engaged in the honest hard labor of making things work.  Steering clear of cities, we got a view of a different kind of commerce than I am used to.  It has given me something to think about.

One the way home from Nashville, we stopped in Sewanee TN to have lunch with our good friend who teaches high school English and Journalism there.  Martha Lee met us at The Blue Chair, a quaint cafe on the campus of The University of the South.  Doris was allowed to sit with us on the patio while we ate.  She ordered bacon and was well-pleased.

The drive from Sewanee to Atlanta, which should take about 3 hours at the most, took far longer than that.  It was raining steadily, Brad was sleepy and tired of driving, and the closer we got to Atlanta, the highway regained the familiar drudgery of billboards, gas stations, fast food restaurants, discount shopping malls.  A too-small truck pulling a top-heavy RV in front of us lost control and was swerving dangerously back and forth across two lanes of traffic.  Tractor trailers and cars manoeuvred crazily to get out of its way.  Brad said “Look at that!  We are going to see it jack-knife.”  I didn’t want to see it wreck.  I also knew that if it did, we would not be able to stop and would plow into it and would likely be late for dinner at Joyce’s (or perhaps early for dinner at the Pearly Gates).   We slowed way down and let the automotive circus get ahead of us.  The RV continued to swerve and disappeared around a curve.  I don’t know whether the driver ever regained control.  Brad pulled into a filling station and took a 15 minute nap.   I resumed breathing.

We pulled into the farm at 6:50 in the pouring rain.   Thinking we would have to unhitch the truck in the mud and drive straight to Joyce’s house (about 700 yards down the dirt road), we were thrilled to see Brad’s brother Tom and nephew Zac drive up behind us and give us a ride to the party.   A great reunion ensued, with everyone talking at once and whipping up a great communal dinner of roast pork by Joyce, collards and kale from Jennie’s garden, and sweet potatoes, pears and cherries concocted together in Athalie’s inimitable way.  Somehow in the happiness of the evening, we managed to lose Doris.  We called and called and finally went home looking for her, thinking she may have preceded us to the cabin.  No Doris.   We retraced our steps and met Joyce loading Doris in her car to bring her to us — she had gotten trapped in the pantry!

One more thing before I say good-bye.  Brad, Doris and I voted on the single most unexpectedly useful item we took on the trip.  While the collapsible plastic yellow foot stool, ceiling projecto clock and wi-fi hot spot gizzy got two votes each, the only unanimous vote was for “Brad.”

Thanks for following along in this inaugural edition of Tales from Towed Haul.  I hope to take you along on future trips, which we are already mulling around in our minds.

May 8, 2014.  Penultimate day on the road.

Before long, we arrived at the area I had read about with interest in the truck the other day – literally called Land Between the Lakes.  It is the largest inland peninsula in the US, spanning significant parts of middle TN and western KY and lying between Kentucky Lake on the west and Lake Barkley on the east (named after Albert Barkley, a Kentuckian who was HST’s VEEP).  This whole tremendous area was confiscated by the Federal government and designated as a National Recreation Area by President Kennedy in 1963.  Wikipedia reports that many area residents resented the condemnation of their lands, especially when it was explained to them that most of the area was not to be flooded but rather to become a park.  The former settlements of Tharpe, TN, Model TN and Golden Pond, KY were forcibly abandoned.  This strikes a particular sour note with me, as I recall vividly how overwrought we all were when the Corps of Engineers in the mid-1960s condemned my Aunt Ginny’s gorgeous 60-acre home on banks of the Chattahoochee River to build West Point Dam for flood control.   While flood control was a noble and successful goal for the dam, Aunt Ginny’s beautiful home was not (as they had warned) put underwater, but magically changed from a woodland bird and wildflower sanctuary to a stunning lake front property, which (because the COE would not let anyone occupy it) fell into ruin, was enjoyed by vandals, and collapsed over the ensuing 25 years.   Eventually, the COE allowed a crowd from Columbus to restore it and now it is used as a public event space, for weddings and things like that.  We rented it for Daddy’s second wedding!  Daddy (then age 91) spent his honeymoon night in his sister’s bedroom.  Brad and I slept down the hall in Uncle Ed’s old bedroom.  We all had breakfast the next morning in the garden on the banks of the lake — its was beyond fantastic.

Yesterday, we pulled over for lunch in one of the scenic overlooks in the Land Between the Lakes.  We had chilled salad nicoise with nut bread and the rest of Polly’s olives that she brought to Utah directly from Greece last week (basically, tuna fish sandwiches, which were delicious).  Afterwards, we looked in on a few of the campsites and other amenities of this Kennedy-era playground.

We plunged into Nashville late in the afternoon — it was a long drive for some reason.  At the entrance to Bledsoe State Park (our destination), I noted with interest a huge sign saying that anyone using alcohol or drugs in the park would not only be evicted without ceremony but also prosecuted within an inch of his or her life.  This sign was repeated about every 50 feet.  I started planning what glasses we would use for our cocktail hour.  Coffee mugs?

Our final campsite is, once again, on the banks of a lake.  Each lake has its own personality.   This one is almost swamp-like, with cypress knees and marsh reeds along the shoreline and the distinctive Southern aroma of teaming pond life.   We walked along the shoreline path to a long wooden dock and pavilion for viewing wildlife.  I stalked a blue heron with Brad’s camera and watched him (the heron) catch several fish from his comfortable knee-high stance in the water, but I couldn’t entice him to fly away in that picturesque way they have.  It was getting too dark for good pictures anyway.

After dinner, Brad and I had one final game of Canasta — in which he beat the dickens out of me — gleefully I might add.   Time to head up the wagon for home.  Tomorrow we’ll be having dinner with Jennie and Joyce and (we hope) Phil and Athalie and Tom and Chylon and Zac!

May 7, 2014.  Today the drive was moderately long (250 miles) and not very picturesque.  I caught up on my pressing crossword puzzles and email correspondence.  We drove through St. Louis, which is much larger than I expected, and snapped a shot of the Arch and the baseball stadium, which the expressway runs right over!

Today’s campground is in a Corps of Engineer’s park near Benton, Illinois.  Rend Lake is huge — 19,000 acres with 167 mile of shoreline, and full to the brim — a change from all the lakes we have experienced on this trip.  The park has a comprehensive recreational complex, including a lodge (which to my experienced eye looks like a Federal prison), convention center, hunting preserve, golf course, horse-back riding facility, restaurants, boat ramps and things of that ilk.  But all is quiet today.   It being a weekday in the middle of May, we had our pick of 250 or so campsites.  We nabbed the best one in the park, as far as I am concerned.  It is on a long flat expanse of new-mown grass by the side of the lake, under a  wonderful sweetgum tree, with no neighbors and a clear view to the Southern sky for our satellite TV so we can watch the third game in the Braves – Cardinals match-up.  (Braves lost — hiss.)

Doris had a field day at the lake  — rolling in the grass, chasing sticks, and generally being out of the truck for a few hours.   We saw a couple of ski boats (the sound of them slapping rhythmically over the waves made me homesick for the Backwater), but nothing distracting from the lovely peace of the afternoon and evening.  Brad and I sat outside and soaked in the lake afternoon air.  It is so nice to breathe the familiar moist coolish air of a Southern spring and listen to the complex music of birds and crickets.   We had spaghetti for dinner and played a death match of Canasta.  This time I won, making me the undisputed “queen” for the week.  The loser has to draw a picture of the of the winner as “queen” or “king” at the bottom of the score card for each game.  We have quite a nice collection of drawings, which we will offer up to the High when we get home.

Tomorrow we head for Nashville, via Kentucky.  I hope to stop for lunch in the “Land Between the Lakes”  — more on that later if we in fact do that.

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May 6, 2014.  We traversed the rest of the long State of Kansas, passing over endless farmland so green, organized and industrious it makes you wonder how anyone in American goes hungry.  Brad was interested in seeing the huge grain elevators being emptied by cranes into trucks for distribution along the wonderous Interstate system.  We also noted that Kansas (being located in the Great American wind tunnel) has as many wind farms as Oklahoma.  We drove close to some wind mills and I was able to see just how huge and complex the deceptively simple things are and why they cost over $1 million each to manufacture and install.  It was like looking at a butterfly close up and taking note of its central bug.  Each arm is the size of the wing of a jumbo jet and the turbine in the center is the size of a Class A  motor home.  There is a small set of steps at the base leading up to a  door in the “stem”, which must contain either an elevator or a pretty awesome step latter to carry people 300 feet to the top to do whatever they do up there.  Brad explained to me that three arms is the optimal number for balance.  Although a single blade would be far more efficient from a pure wind-power standpoint (the blade leaves a wake of air as it turns, which interferes with the next blade), it would be mechanically impractical maintain a one-armed windmill.

Brad worked his now-expected magic for selecting a great campground.  This one is in the tiny but historically significant village of Arrow Rock, MO (population 56) on the Lewis and Clark Trail.  In the 1850s, the town had a large (for then in the West) population of more than 1200, but the Missouri River changed course, the railroad re-routed and the town was abandoned.  A few years ago, local residents raised money to renovate the beautiful dilapidated buildings and bring the town back to life.  They were able to obtain governmental grants (either State or federal or both) due to the historical significance of it being right on the L&C Trail.  Today, the beautifully restored old town has five small B&Bs, four nice restaurants, several shops, a remarkable local playhouse staging eight productions a year, and 56 very lucky residents!  They host a fall festival that attracts hundreds of people — I wish it were here today.

The campground in Arrow Rock state park is a 1/2 mile stroll from the middle of town.  We are the only ones staying here tonight!  Our site is absolutely beautiful, by a lake (0f course) in a field of new-mown, impossibly green, grass in a grove of maple trees.  The only set-back is the temperature — 89 degrees at seven pm.  We sat outside by the lake for a while, but finally retreated to the air-conditioned Airstream to watch the end of the Braves game — a win, finally, against St Louis!   Somehow we must have left the door open for a few minutes, as hundreds of small flying bugs (type unknown to us) got in and terrorized me.  It is my custom, when touched by a bug of any kind, to scream and throw whatever I am holding across the room.  I had to quit reading my Kindle.  Brad had to kill 300 bugs.  After that, we slept peacefully in the AC, covered by a thin sheet.

Today (Wednesday) we head out across Illinois and perhaps into the bottom tip of Kentucky.  We had hoped to see a lot of Kentucky horse county, but we’ll leave that for another trip.

May 5, 2014.  Three weeks on the road!  It seems like a nanosecond and also a lifetime.  I think we will be back in Atlanta on Friday, so this adventure is in the top of the ninth inning.

I learned two things today that really surprised me.

1.  The Kansas campground lady told us that last week during the tornadoes, campers were stranded there for three days, as the DOT closed the highway due to winds up to 75 MPH.  Brad says that the power of wind is the factor of the cube of the wind’s speed!   You can see how something like that could flip a semi (and did).  I’ll bet those stranded campers were thankful for the steakhouse,  laun-dro-mat, putt-putt golf and Cap’n Bob’s Brew Pub (which I forgot to mention is also in the campgound).

2.  Kansas is NOT all one big flat farm!  We had a really short drive today (135 miles) because Brad found a place on the state park website last night that he really wanted to see — Wilson Reservoir, smack dab in the middle of Kansas.  I was a little discouraged, as I am like a horse heading for the barn — ready to get back to Georgia; do we really need to spend two nights in KANSAS?  But demonstrating the quiet subservience for which I am widely known,  I didn’t pitch a fit.  It pays to be a mouse!   As we turned off the interstate at the appointed exit for Wilson, we found ourselves in high (for Kansas) rolling hills and beautiful trees — mostly cottonwoods, I believe.  There are two campgrounds here; a Kansas State park and a Corps of Engineers park.  We had reservations at the State park, but missed the turn and wound up at the other.  It was breathtakingly beautiful; endless acres of rolling grassy hills edging the lake on this brisk sunny day (and only one other camper that we could see).  The gate lady pointed out that we had the wrong park, but invited us to drive around and look and said we could come back if we liked it better after seeing the State park and could choose any site we wanted.  I made up my mind to do that, as I could not imagine anything that wonderful anywhere else.  I was wrong!  The site Brad had pre-selected for us at the State park was on a grassy ledge overlooking the beach in the shade of a grand cottonwood tree, and totally isolated.  Not another camper anywhere in sight.  It was like being in a Grace Kelly movie — Monaco in the middle of Kansas, but without all the flowers and dangerous curves.

Wilson Reservoir is absolutely gorgeous — clear bright blue water with whitecaps in the center and small gentle waves at the shore, due to the constant wind.  The basin of the lake is smooth rock with the appearance of yellowish lava.  (The water is low this time of year, as it has been at all lakes we have seen on this trip, which makes for great wandering along the shoreline.)  We sat on the wide rocky beach outside our front door and waded out into the lapping waves.  Brisk, but not too cold!  The sand (0r rock) has the consistency of hardened brown sugar; solid enough to walk on, but you can crumble it in your hand with a little effort.  Doris loved it.  She chased sticks for a while and then spotted some ducks in the lake and lit out after them.  Fortunately they can swim much faster than she can, so she came back empty-muzzled.

We arrived here at 1 pm due to the short drive and relished having the whole afternoon and night in such an idyllic place.  We drank an entire bottle of Champaign for lunch with rat cheese and crackers, while Brad beat me to pieces at Canasta.  I just taught him how to play last week and he already out-strategizes me.   Time to make up some more rules.

We went for a hike on the Dakota trail here in the park.  As the sign did not indicate how long the trail is, we stopped after a goodly while and walked back so we would be sure to catch the sunset over the lake.  I hope the pictures do it justice.  If not, just imagine it like it was.

I am thankful for this day.  One of the best Mondays on record.

May 4, 2014.  We awoke to the sun coming up over the snowy peaks and lighting up the single white aspen in front of our trailer — yet another change in our magical dining room wallpaper.  I think that is my favorite part of camping.  That, and everything else.

We did a pretty nippish morning routine of (i) showering, (ii) making up the bed while stepping over and around Doris, (iii) fixing breakfast of oatmeal and coffee, (iv) cleaning up same, (v) transferring a million pictures from the cameras to the computer, (vi) writing yesterday’s blog post, (vii) securing all the interior systems for travel (bungee cord the TV, disassemble and store the two lamps, clean the shower and bathroom, make sure all the fans and pumps are turned off, shake the three rugs and sweep the floor), and (viii) whatever Brad does.

On the road by 10 am, we set out across the rest of highway 24 through the beautiful Saint Ishmael (or Mother Isabelle or something like that) National Forest, which kept our heads whipping around and camera clicking.  Brad suggested that I use his camera today, as it is a thousand times better in every way than the camera on my iPad and he figures there is little I could do to destroy it while he is sitting there in the driver’s seat listening to my comments such as “I wonder what this button does.”  It is a fabulous camera.  I want one now (except that it does not fit in my purse — or my car, for that matter).

We came across Wilkerson Pass in Pike National Forest and decided to stop.  Man!  I’m so glad we did.  The views from there made the entire State of Utah seem like a clownish Pixar cartoon.  I savored the more human-scale beauty of the miles-long vistas over wheat-colored fields of grass,  familiar aspens (now finally budding with tiny seed pod looking things), nice normal-colored boulders in the foreground, and the Colorado snow-covered mountains in the distance.  You may think this sounds very much the same as what I have been describing for two weeks but it was softer and more beautiful for its believability.  I ran around in it without fear of death.

Fun fact about aspens: while they do produce seeds, they mainly propagate by spreading their roots, so that great stands of aspens are likely to be genetically identical — essentially one tremendous tree!  I don’t know why, but that seems creepy to me.  It makes them seem like one big Siamese twin.  Brad says that’s ridiculous.  He’s usually right.

Click, click, click.  Brad’s camera is intoxicating.  As we left the mountainous area and approached I-70, we moved into the high plains part of Colorado.  We stopped for a late lunch in Simla (incorporated 1912, elevation 6500 ft, population 500), at the Country Corner Cafe, a tiny family-owned restaurant.  Our waitress, the daughter, reminded us both of you, Mardi!  She was impossibly skinny and effervescent, and sat with us to take our orders.  When we inquired about various menu options, she would say things like, “Wow, if you haven’t tasted my Dad’s green chile sauce you haven’t lived!”  I ordered an open-faced cheeseburger with her Dad’s green chili sauce.  Turns out, I hadn’t lived before that.  They also do take-out and delivery:  the phone rang while we were eating and the daughter/waitress listened for a while and said, “Got it.  I’ll go find my Mom and see if she can bring it over to you.”  (Note, no address inquiry necessary).  Her Mom is also a skillful potter; her wares were displayed all over the one-room restaurant.  I bought a small shallow dish that I have been looking for for years — exactly the same diameter as one of those hummus containers that you hate to put on the table for company but do anyway.  Problem solved!

Once we got on I-70, Colorado began to look a lot like Kansas.  Kansas looks like what you would expect — endless, flat, productive farm land.  We covered a lot of ground and still are in the western part of Kansas.  Our campsite here is a commercial one, but kind of funky in a nice way.  Right here at our disposal are an antiques store (specializing in rusty farm implements and banana-seat bicycles from what I can see from here), a steakhouse that was favorably-touted at the Kansas welcome center, a laun-dro-mat, a miniature golf course, and wild rabbits everywhere!  Doris is insane with desire to be unsupervised for a few minutes.

As I write this (Monday morning), Brad is fixing scrambled eggs, bacon and flaky biscuits.   Life is good as we set off for eastern Kansas.  This is one long state!

May 3, 2014.  Our campsite in Moab (one of the few relatively highly populated towns in southern Utah) was in a commercial campground nestled in deep red, dry canyons.  (It was serviceable and clean, but not my favorite — too many RVs lined up together with people hanging their moo-moos and tank tops out to dry.)

This morning we drove the two miles to Arches National Park.  Expecting more of the same arid canyons of the last day or so, we both laughed out loud when we started up the mountain and were struck with yet a new example of gargantuan rocks wrestled into impossible formations.  How does God think these things up?  The part we really appreciated were sheer glass-smooth walls of red rock rising 150 feet straight up.  The gently carved tops gave them the look of insanely big government buildings.  Further on in the park, we came to the arches that give the park its name and you have seen on many map covers.  We were not as wowed by them somehow — perhaps we are jaded at this point or knew generally what to expect.  The third feature of the park was a strange vast floor consisting of petrified undulating dunes stretching out for miles, with snow-covered mountains in the distance.  Amid these dunes here and there arose gargantuan (in some cases, suggestive) pillars and globs of red stalagmites which for some unknown reason they refer to as the Garden of Eden.  That is not what would have sprung to my mind, were I on the naming committee.   We got our National Park Passport stamped for Arches and headed out at noon.

We nipped up to I-70 and stayed on it all the way to Vail CO (about 200 miles).  As we entered Colorado, we bade goodbye to the canyonlands (we thought) and welcomed expansive professional cattle ranches (some with their own personal Interstate exit) and greening cottonwood trees along the banks of the then-placid Colorado River.  Now and then we encountered more strange mountain ranges — of the sandy white, cumbly-top variety.  However when we entered the town of Glenwood Springs (the exit for Aspen) we were treated with the most beautiful stretch of Interstate Highway I have ever seen.  The road winds through the sheer cliffs of the Rocky Mountains along the very edge of the now-frisky Colorado River on which joyful people were white-water kayaking and beside which a coal train ran in and out of tunnels carved in the rock walls of the canyon.   What a fun ride!

At Vail, we headed down scenic highway 24 to the festive little town of Minturn, full of shops, restaurants and bars catering to the ski crowd.  About three miles later we came to a complete standstill — some kind of accident and fire had just occurred and there were three fire engines, an ambulance and at least ten police cars.  We were about third in line in the traffic jam and cars began to back up behind us for miles.  There was no way to turn around in a 28-foot Airstream on that little two-lane road.  We sat there for 45 minutes eating Oreos and drinking tepid coffee from our thermos.  Finally Brad got to talk to a policeman and he said it would be several hours before the road would clear, so he let us drive forward and do a big loop around a clump of police cars so we could turn around.  He directed traffic as we did the turn and said “you all have a nice day!”  We got back on I-70 and detoured through Copper Mountain ski resort and got back on highway 24 past the accident.  This gorgeous detour took us up to 10,000 feet and through snow-covered mountains peppered with dark green firs.  It looked as if Copper Mt. could still be open for business as there was so much snow on the slopes and everywhere else — but it too has closed for the season.

To end this National Geographic day of travel, we drove along the Arkansas River (I think it was) through softly undulating grassy hills and bare aspen trees to the little hamlet of Buena Vista and our family-owned campground aptly named Snowy Peaks.  We ate great leftovers for dinner (beef rib stew and a nice Malbec) and watched the Braves lose their 5th game in a row.  Tomorrow we head for Kansas.

May 2, 2014.  Twenty-two years ago today, Brad and I married in the West Point First United Methodist Church and had our reception at the Sibley Horticultural Center in Callaway Gardens, about 20 miles away.  It was a grand — if prolonged — occasion (some of you remember it).  It has been an amazingly fine 22 years and this was a perfect way to celebrate our anniversary.

Let’s start with our farewell dinner last night.  We did indeed eat tacos outdoors in the circular bosom of our three Airstreams.  Richard fixed killer margaritas with some kind of fancy tequilla and salt imported from Africa (probably).  Anyway, I enjoyed them a lot.  Later we sat around the fire and had Utahan pies, s’mores and great jokes (what a natural combination).  Bill and Brad and I stayed up very late marvelling at the stars; billions and billions more than you can see in Atlanta.  Out here, the sky is the central character — painfully blue in the daytime, overpoweringly vast at night.  It’s hard to stay cemented to the surface of the Earth gazing into that expanse of stars, planets, asteroids, galaxies.

Everything in this area known as the Golden Circle (encompassing big swatches of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado) is comically breathtaking.  I have been forced to consult a thesaurus for more expostulations akin to “golly!”.    See if you can spot them throughout this post.  Visitors to this area would benefit from a few more such terms in the English language, just as the Sami language (of Norway, Sweden and Finland) has around 1,000 different words for reindeer.

Deciding to generally start heading East and towards home, Brad, Doris and I took the 124-mile long All-American scenic byway of UT Highway 12, past Bryce Canyon (see Days Sixteen and Seventeen) and on through the Grand Staircase – Escalante National Monument.  I was wrong in Day Twelve and a Half in thinking I had seen this “staircase” in a small segment of US 89 between Page and Kanab — rather, it is the name given to a 1.9 million acre expanse containing so-called slickrock canyon lands, prehistoric village sites, ranch land, arid plateaus, stone arches, mesas and a plethora of other unbelievable sights.  Hypers!  Every turn in the road slaps one in the face with a new vista surpassing the last.  The rocks vary in color and formation from deep red hoodoos as in Bryce, to stark white hoodoos and cliffs, to mountains of a greenish color, to an ugly gray sandish substance that lies in pyramidal mounds the foot of majestic cliffs of the same color, as if they were piles of slag left over from a monstrous manufacturing mishap.  Ouch!  This quadrad of scenes goes on for miles in surprising juxtaposition.  Then we entered the Boulder Mountain area, which took us up to 9,000 feet along an alpine ridge with vast forests of white aspens, dark green firs and remnants of snow on the ground.  Jeepers!  Just for fun, we followed a detour to a closed remote campsite.  The 6-mile dirt road at first was just beautiful — winding through tall pines with a flat sun-dappled forest floor covered with pine needles and edged by a swift rocky stream.  I considered cancelling the trip and just living here.   After about 3 miles of this idyl, around a curve, we were met with a 100-mile vista of more mesas and plateaus and the road turned into a dusty desert-like path leading down to a depleted but bright blue lake.  Finally, after a jaw (and Airstream) rattling drive on the rutted road, we came to four deserted campsites with no hook-ups for water or electricity and not a soul in sight.  Egad!  We managed to turn our 50-foot beast around and get back on the paved road, which lead us into Capitol Reef National Park.  Phew!

Capitol Reef National Park is similar in feel to Zion and Bryce, only more breathtaking in scope, if you can envision that — and with an overlay of Mormon history.  We visited an old Mormon farm community called Fruita, which was a green oasis of fruit orchards thriving at the foot of the colossal rock canyon walls.  We had homemade ice cream in a tiny house there and I bought a book telling the amazing history of the town and others similar to it that were literally put out of commission when the National Park Service established the Capitol Reef National Monument in 1937.

At 5:35 pm, we turned East on I-70, marking the official return-trip segment of our journey.  Tonight we are camping in Moab and will visit Arches National Park in the morning.  Then on to Vail.  When we get back on I-70 on Sunday, we’ll start picking up speed.   Amen!

May Day!  May Day!  Just kidding –it is May 1.

Late last night after dinner, Vickie and Rufus’ daughter Lainey arrived from Moab UT, or thereabouts.  We were thrilled to see her.  She was supposed to have joined them for the whole week, but car trouble intervened and caused her to miss the first few days.  She is taking an interlude between college and business school to hang out in the West with some friends.  She’s no fool — no use waiting until retirement to taste the good life!   Lainey was with us in France in August last year and we go “way back.”

This morning we all slept a little later than usual — lolling around until almost 8 am.  We went for another day of hiking in splendid Bryce Canyon.  This time the adventurous group (including Lainey her in sleeveless hiking gear!) hiked the 8-mile Fairyland Trail.  Mara, Polly and I did the 3-mile trail on top of the canyon — dressed in 5 layers of jackets and hats.  We shed almost everything as the sun came down in earnest.  It’s not that easy to hike at 7800 feet when you are not acclimated to it.

Tonight, the temperature will allow us to eat outside at our communal picnic tables around a campfire.   Polly is making tacos and corn salad.  Brad went into town to pick up peach and apple pies that he special-ordered yesterday from a local restaurant which claims to make the best pies in Utah.  Not sure if that is a high bar or not!  I’ll let you know.

Tomorrow, the Atlanta contingent is heading back to Zion so Lainey can experience the great  hiking there.  The next day they will return their Airstream 2 Go and spend their final night in Las Vegas.  Polly and Richard will head back to WYO tomorrow and Brad, Doris and I will venture on our way back East.  We have not yet planned our route home, but it will probably be along I-70, as we would like to go through Kentucky horse country on the way home.

Happy Uno de Mayo!