National Park #19, canceled March 22, 2021
After our quick stop at the Mesa Verde visitor center, we were off to the Needles district of Canyonlands. Along the way we stopped at Newspaper Rock, which is covered in stunningly preserved ancient petroglyphs.
Once in Canyonlands our first stop was the visitor center and gift shop. Then we went to Cave Spring, a 0.6 mile loop trail that’s packed with cool stuff. It starts at a cowboy camp that was used for decades up until 1975. Then you come to Cave Spring, a year round source of water hidden under a large rock overhang. There are more petroglyphs there, and the ceiling of the cave is blackened from smoke. Then the hike gets really fun. You climb up two ladders onto a large section of slickrock with an awesome view of the surrounding landscape. The kids had a great time running around on there.
Then we followed the scenic road to Pothole Point – more slickrock that the kids loved exploring on. At the end of the road was Big Canyon Overlook. The kids didn’t want to get out of the car, and while Jeremy and I were taking pictures, they were making silly hand gestures at passing cars. One of them parked and the guy came over and said hello to them. Turns out he does Star Wars cosplay and he gave us all his trading cards. The kids found it hilarious that their hand signals worked!
From there we went into Moab, where we picked up batteries for our tent lantern. We also stopped at Moab Rock Shop that had all sorts of rocks, gems, fossils, and dinosaur bones. Souvenirs were purchased, but I think everyone had the most fun just exploring the shop. For dinner, we introduced the niece and nephews to Thai food–and they loved it! We had to order an extra plate of pad thai to satisfy everyone!
We had booked two nights at Devils Garden Campground in Arches since Canyonlands and Arches are so close together. We spent the next day exploring Arches, then visited the Island in the Sky district of Canyonlands on our way out. First up, though, was Dead Horse Point State Park, which has an incredible view of a gooseneck bend in the Colorado River. In Canyonlands, we hiked to Mesa Arch, which is featured as one of the default wallpapers on Windows computers. Then we stopped at Green River View for a spectacular look into the canyon. We followed the scenic drive down to the viewpoint at the end. It was cool identifying scenery we had seen two days earlier in the Needles district.
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