I survived Utah – Day 1 – Arches National Park

Well, Ian and I are back from Utah in one piece, which is saying a lot given the odds we had on this trip.  Since Ian worked the night before and I had a late final, our sleep totals when we landed were 1.5 hours and 6 hours respectively.  When we finally got to our rental car agency (whose computers were down making everything super slow) the rental girl tried every scare tactic in the book to get us to upgrade our car:

Girl: You should upgrade.  It’s going to snow this weekend!

Us: Oh, we won’t be in Salt Lake.

Girl: Where are you going?

Us: Moab.

Girl: Where?

Us: Down South.

Girl: Oh, well it’s going to snow there too!

Right.

Girl: You should get a heavier car.

Us: This one’s fine.

Girl: No, but you’ll slide everywhere.  It’s going to be twelve inches of snow!

Us: It’s okay, we’ve driven in snow before.

Girl: But not like this.

Us: We’re from the East Coast.  It’s worse than this.

Girl:

Finally she crumbled.  We started our journey to signs of Windy Road Next 50 miles, Watch for Falling Rock, and Deer crossing.  It was one lane in each direction.  A dubious start to our trip.

Five hours later we made it to Moab, Utah.  Moab is a sleepy tourist town, thriving only due to its proximity to both Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park.  We dropped off our bags at the hotel and headed to Arches around 2 pm.

With literally one other car in the park with us, we had the whole thing to ourselves.  Arches has the highest concentration of stone arches in the United States.  To be an arch, an opening must measure three feet from one base to the other base.  And the arches and rock formations are awe-inspiring and huge.  Slabs of rock weighing hundreds of pounds balance delicately on thin bases, held in place by gravity and luck.

We drove by a formation that looked like three women standing together.  “I’ll call it the Three Girls,” I announced proudly to Ian.

“Lame,” he said.

But when I pulled out the map I discovered that the rock did have a name, “Three Gossips.”  I was pretty darn close.  I should be a rock namer.  I bet I’d be pretty good.

After a few hours of exploring and a spectacular sunset we headed back to Moab.  We found a cute Mexican restaurant for dinner.  Pretty much, when we go on these trips Ian and I get so hungry that everything we eat is The Best Food Ever.  The dinner was no exception.  Full and happy and tired, we went to the hotel room, turned up the heat, and fell asleep at 7 pm.

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