Rockies through to Monument

SUNDAY 17th June

Left rather abruptly as we found a library where we could connect up and send off everything!

Anyway tortuous driving with heavy Sunday traffic, escapes from Denver, saw us passing along many gorges, no valleys, with individual houses many rather nice, until we reached an overwhelmingly tripperish town of Estes Park just outside the boundary of the national park. Camped in the Park at Morraine Campground approached via a bone shaking 1.5 mile road which was being reconstruted and was down to bare rock at the time of our visit. Lovely site great views and sited at 8250 ft.

Now I mention Estes Park for a particular reason. I have commented on forest fires earlier, we read today 25th June in the local paper that a fire has been raging around Estes Park, 1400 people have been evacuated, 21 homes lost to date and the whole area closed off. we would not have been able to do that route or we could alternatively have been involved with the fire!

Having driven all over the place i had thought heights were perhaps behind us, what an idiot. Monday 18th saw us off around the north western perimeter of the Park and statred with a two hour slow climb., magnificant mountain scenery quite outstanding and a hieght gain to 12450 ft on the road with a coffee stop at the visitors centre at 12145 ft.

Where are you from, England, oh please send us some of your rain is a automatic response by just about everyone now. Here at the Visitors centre the ranger said in June last year when we opened up ther was 12ft of snow covering areas of the building, this year no snow and no rain too, things are bad the opposite way to the UK.

A good run down the rockies to Granby past a large an pretty lake onto the 40 and thence across a back road to interstate 70 for the run to Glenwood Springs. We've now picked up the Colorado River again and where this meets mountains it means canyons big huge ones quite narrow with the road at the base and mountains towering thosands of feet above you. A variety of scenery therefore and mostly pastoral.

A complete no sequeter, way back in Wyoming I spoke of the pastoral agrarian landscape helped by the irrigation started by Buffalo Bill which extended for some 30 to40 miles and covered an area of some 1500 sq miles. Towards its NE corner the Yellowstone River was the source for water, a full and fast flowing river. The whole valley was prosperous and looked a dream for agriculture. At the border with Momtana the valley and river continued for 30 miles but one yard inside montana was desert, useless scrub land and nothing, green and fertile to zilch in one stride.

Back again at Glenwood Springs which is really a ski resort we stayed in a rundown mainly residential site called The Hideout, it sufficed just, the town itself did nothing to excite us.

19th to 21st JUNE

Form Glenwood Springs we took the 70 past naval shale oil reserves miles of them whatever they are and decided to take a route cutting a corner off to Moab via the 128 which was described at the start as a narrow winding road with 20mph hairpins, an obvious challenge and seemingly a bleak one from the desert start in considerable heat. One moment we were twisting and turning when suddenly round a corner was scenery the like of which we had never seen before in fact quite the best road scenery to date. Broad valley and canyons, all the pinacles and odd rock formations plus individual monoliths standing up all over the place in fact like monument valley of cowboy fame with mountains closer by which had been sculpted by a god somehow. Although in the same area as CanyonLand the basic valley and gorge bottom was gentler and not quite so demonic.

Moab and a campsite Canyonlands CG for two

nights. Moab a reasonable town which sells itself on outdoor activity such as white water rafting, off road trips etc. Actually I would be disapointwd with the rafting as we saw on our back road in twenty or more rafts, 12 people in an inflateable, paddling hot and aimlessly down th Colorado River and more or less struggling to get over the rapids as the river is very low for the time of year.

There is a superb Indian Atrifacts shop in town.

Our stop was to visit Canyonland and The Arches National Parks. Canyonland is a series of canyons viewed from above and the area is vast and that is an understatement. From above you look down from various view points to a rim about 1000 ft below which is the top of another canyon which falls again down hundreds of feet and this in turn becomes the rim of yet another gorge below that. It is possible to drive round the second rim on an old trail used by the uranium miners, it takes two days to complete. I said vast, just looking out over one section one could drop the Isle of Whight into it and still have water around it, I suppose a 360 degree view around would pobably take in the whole of Ireland with some to spare.

This land is virtually inaccessible, totally barren, bare fractured land high up at 7000ft and one of the most inhospitable place I have seen. Worth a visit just to see one of natures facades.

Arches National Park was a dissapointment, far too busy, arches in rocks are not particularly interesting and in general the worst park we have been to.

JUNE 21 st saw us I suppose at my wish taking a day to visit Lake Powell a monster Lake some 200 odd miles long formed when the Colorado River was dammed by the Hoover Dam. Glen Canyon with a ferry across the lake sounded good and i hoped for a rather greener setting with the tree lined lake etc. Nothing could be further from reality, the lake was there no access to the shore line it is mostly mountain straaight into water, no greenery just desert mountain and rock. Ferry every 2 hours to same thing on other side, campsite 50 dollars, we turned round and came back to Blanding for the night a round trip of 180 mile for nothing. Idilic settings are non existent in this neck of the woods. Oh temperature was 93F.

JUNE 22 onward to the Messa Verde National Park where we stayed at the parks Maresfield site. The Messa Verde Park states it is the only national park to focus on preseving the buildings and dwellings of the former inhabitants of the area. The buildings mainly consist of dwellings built within caves or overhangs in the cliff faces of the various gorges. Dated to around 850 60 1300 AD, curiously the Americans call these people pre historic separated by a common language or what! The dwellings are difficult to get to and some are downright impossible they were approached when in use by use of handholds in the cliff face. Quite why they came from townships on the measa above where they grew crops and hunted no one knows and why they were abandoned by 1300 no on can say though obviously there are many theories.. We had a group guided tour round one "township" called pueblo in these areas which was fascinating though the ladder access and egress was a little challenging. High high up place yet again, will we ever get back down.

Large forest fire to the east blotted out the sky for the evening and was still growing in the morning when we left fanned by a strong wind again we later read evacuations and property loss had occurred and the fir e was still in control,

JUNE 23rd to Monument Valley a longish drive through some of the most desolate areas yet we both thought about the same time that we had been travelling for the last 50 miles though a very nasty looking slag heap. I keep harping back to this but desolation hardly describes some of these areas, hell might be more appropriate. Then suddenly up a slope and everything changes from desert yellow and nasty to deep red and over the brow and into Monument Valley. Another world of endless flatland with thes monumental shapes sticking up everywhere many so familiar from cowboy and many other films. Great w shaped rock patterns and colours which put the Isle of White colours to shame, the wavey shape is incorporated in much of the Indian craftwork. The whole are is controlled by the Naverro Indians.

The Valley was great to see and is again immense. We stayed inGoldings Camp Park right opposite some of the well known monoliths and went to a showing of Stage Coach 1939 John Wayne film which was filmed in the Valley. Good fun .