Moab, Utah

We were excited to leave the hot Sedona air and were headed back to Utah. On our way to Moab, we stopped by Monument Valley.

We stayed at the Garden of the Gods and boondocked.

The location had spectacular views. This was the best boondocking spot we have been at. At night, we looked at the stars. We saw a million of them!

We had a fun time trying to get level since it was just off the dirt road.

We continued on to Moab. It was a great location for our visits to Arches and Canyonlands National Park.

Getting to Moab meant full hook-ups!

Real showers and emptying the tanks were a priority. The campground wasn’t very nice. Many of the people looked like they lived there permanently and didn’t keep up with maintaining their “front yard”.

The next day we headed into Arches National Park. Our first stop was the visitor center to see the exhibits on display and grab two permits to the Fiery Furnace.

We enjoyed our hike through Park Avenue and marveled at the huge rock walls.

The walk was only a mile one way but we were exhausted since it was such a dry heat. After a short water break, we continued on.

We got to the famous Delicate Arch trailhead and started our hike. The next time you see a Utah license plate, check out the design. It features Delicate Arch.

We made sure we had plenty of water. There was a ranger standing by the trailhead encouraging hikers to bring adequate amounts of water.

This was one of our tougher hikes due to the heat. Jared asked multiple times if I was sure I wanted to go all the way to the top. The hike started out pretty flat but soon developed into a pretty steep trek.

We stopped a bunch of times and a few of those times, we contemplated turning back because of the heat. We decided to keep on going.

We came upon the arch and it was beautiful! Well worth the hike.

We hung back for a bit because we were so tired. The wind started to pick up too so we felt like we could get blown right off the cliff.

Jared talked me into walking down to the actual arch even though it was really windy.

 

Imagine a very beautiful picture of the two of us right next to the arch because we lost those pictures. We even got to touch it!

The hike back down was a lot easier because it was downhill and the wind at least kept air moving.

By the time we got to the car, we didn’t want to get back out.

We checked out the lower viewpoint for the Delicate Arch and barely made the 3 minute walk to the view. Our bodies ached so much; we took our time doing everything.

We headed to Elephant Butte and saw the Windows and the Double Arches. It was pretty cool! Nature made all of this!

We headed back to camp and rested up for another adventurous day.

The Fiery Furnace was so awesome! It consists of narrow passages through sandstone walls.

We got to explore the backcountry of Arches National Park without having to hike 13 miles in. Before giving us the permits, we were required to watch some videos on the sensitive ecosystem and talked to a ranger. They warned us that it is very easy to get lost in the Fiery Furnace.

 

Some crevices were a tight squeeze!

Dirt in Arches is alive! The living dirt is more compact than the sand and helps plants grow and survive in the extreme heat and wind.

We learned the differences between a regular trail and a social trail. We’ve been pointing them out everywhere we go to make sure we don’t walk through them.

The beginning of our adventure was pretty smooth going.

 

We didn’t have too many problems at this point.

 

We were excited to just explore!

Until Jared explored to a place he would not be able to easily get out of.

We had been following small arrows that the Rangers use during their tours but weren’t able to find one at one point.

Jared jumped off a large boulder to see if he could spot an arrow. No luck. Getting down was the easy part. Getting back up was the real issue.

He tried multiple times to get up the rock but was unsuccessful. Realizing he wasn’t able to get back up, he thought maybe he could go around and circle back to where I was standing, at the top of the boulder.

After standing there and waiting with both backpacks and the camera, I started to get even more anxious. I was nervous before since Jared wasn’t able to get up.

I thought I heard Jared calling my name so I started to call out to him through all the crevices I could find. I found the arrow that we were looking for and decided to go through there to see if I could find Jared.

The wind was howling and I kept hearing something. It just wasn’t Jared.

I thought I heard more talking. It still wasn’t Jared. I was so nervous at this point that it was definitely showing by the look on my face.

I spotted another couple. I must’ve looked as frantic as I felt because they told me, “a guy with a hat just went that way” pointing back to the way we came.

We found each other! Jared had went back to the spot he had climbed down and willed himself back up.

After blaming each other and narrowly avoiding a meltdown, we decided it was time to go.

We got lost a few more times but we agreed to always stay together.

Even though we were exhausted from our adventures through the Fiery Furnace, we kept going to explore more of the park.

We went to see more arches!

We saw a lot of interesting rock formations here. The Landscape Arch is the longest natural arch and it looks more delicate than the Delicate Arch.

 

The next day, we headed to Canyonland National Park.

We went to the visitor center and learned more about the layered rock in the canyons.

We decided to hike to the Mesa Arch!

It was pretty cool.

We kept exploring the canyons and saw some impressive rocks.

We didn’t stay too long since we were still tired from the previous days.

After resting in the trailer for a couple of hours, we went out on the town! We checked out some shops and walked around Moab.

We decided to stay another day since Jared wanted to watch the football games. Unfortunately, we had to move sites since someone already booked our site for the next day. We hitched up and moved to our new spot!

We had a little hitch when we were moving spots.

Luckily, it was an easy fix! We tightened the bolts and learned a valuable lesson. We check the bolts on the hitch a lot more frequently now.

We have some amazing memories from our time in Moab and even if we lost some photos, we won’t forget all the adventures we had.