Moment Away

The pressure was on: get from Park City, Utah to Escalante, Utah in less than 5 hours so Ricki (husband) could give his lecture on "Beekeeping." We were miffed when a caravan of tourists stopped on Highway 12 to gawk and film a huge horseshoe rainbow over Henrieville. How dare these tourists hold up our deadline! We sped past them and as we zipped into the Blues, a hologram of yellow, red, and blue spilled into the Blues' ravins. Was this the end of the rainbow? How to capture this moment when we didn't have time, nor was it safe, to take a picture of this pot-of-gold? I realized that this moment will never come again. The sightseers had it right: have your camera ready because you'll never be here, in this moment, again and there is beauty all around you.
Yesterday morning I did capture the moment, via iphone, as the Harvest Moon dipped below Powell Point.

Road Cycling to Kodachrome State Park

We changed our usual morning exercise routine to an early evening road bike ride last night to Kodachrome State Park from Cannonville, about 20 round-trip if you go into the State Park. What a relief to have the temperature cool down the longer we rode bikes. The shadows were long as the sun lost it's luster. Highway 12 has fascinating scenery for road biking, West and North from Escalante, Utah but no shoulders.The road to Kodachrome rarely had vehicles on it, perhaps because of the evening time or it just isn't as crowded as the local National Parks. I felt safe and at ease riding skinny tires on this open road toward Cottonwood pass (just outside Kodachrome), home of Grosvenor Arch and back to Cannonville, and continued east on Highway 12 toward Escalante. Ah, this is where the missing vehicles were going, to Escalante.

Peak Bagging Mt Ellen

This wasn't the first time we've tried to bag Mt Ellen, the highest peak of the Henry Mountains. In July 2009 the conditions were stormy, foggy, and viewless. This year we marched right up to the top of Mt Ellen (11,522 ft) and we could not believe we were at the summit, despite a mailbox of "yays, we did it," in a large cairn on top. No, we had to continue to the other peak, Dry Lakes Peak, a conical peak that drops 400 ft and back up to 11,506'. It did look taller and had a bona fide trail leading to this yonder peak. We saw Factory Butte in Cainville and the La Sals and the Book Cliffs around Green River. It's the 360 degree views that were amazing. We saw herds of buffalo and deer on distant fields and a few ATVer's looking for their wanna-be deer trophies. The drive to MacMillian campground was a 4 hour drive from Escalante but less if you ride a mtn bike to Sandy's Ranch from camp (save 2 hrs driving). Now when I see the Northern most nipple in the Henry Mountains I know that there is more than just one peak to be had.