Utah Part 6 - May 3 to 10

May 3
Km’s Pedalled – 34.5 km’s hiked and biked

Destination – camping on a 4×4 road near Devils Garden

Some Notes – A breezy, cool, and overcast morning. I don’t like the wind at all. Packing up a tent in the wind is both a nightmare and sucks. They are calling for sunnier weather this afternoon.

I didn’t have to wait for that hotter weather very long. Biking down into Salt Valley Wash things warmed up quickly and even more quickly when I had to climb out of the valley. I can’t get over how many colours make up the landscapes here. Reds, oranges, yellows and greens along with blue skies and clouds. On my way to Devils Garden I quickly checked out Skyline Arch.

Skyline Arch

I spent most all of the day hiking Devils Garden. I think I hiked a good 17-18 km’s over the whole afternoon. I was exhausted and beat by the end of the day. I visited Tunnel Arch, Pine Tree Arch, Landscape Arch, Navajo Arch, Partition Arch, Double O Arch, Dark Angel, Private Arch and hiked the entire Primitive Trail. The cloud cover from last nights rain made for some amazing photos.

Tunnel Arch

Pine Tree Arch

Landscape Arch

Partition Arch

Navajo Arch

Double O Arch

Private Arch

I am camping just off a 4×4 road at that end of the park near Devils Garden. I am probably more exposed than I have ever been stealth camping in national park but I don’t expect too many rangers to come down this 4×4 road tonight.

May 4
Km’s Pedalled – 36 km’s hiked and biked

Destination – back on the 4×4 road by Balanced Rock

Some notes – I set my alarm last night as I was not exactly camped in the stealthiest of places. The sun was shining and most of all of yesterdays cloud cover was now gone. A short distance down the road I visited and hiked Sand Dune Arch, Broken Arch and Tapestry Arch. All 3 arches were on the same trail.

Sand Dune Arch

Broken Arch

Tapestry Arch

From there I biked into the Salt Valley Wash to visit the Delicate Arch. Delicate Arch is a 4.8 km one way hike considered “difficult.” I actually spent quite a bit of time at this arch patiently waiting for open opportunities to take photos. I was in no particular rush today. My feet are killing me from all the hiking the last few days. And I was not looking forward to the massive climb out of this valley and I still had one more night in Arches NP.

Delicate Arch

Eventually getting back to my bike I only had a 6.5 km (uphill) bike ride to Balanced Rock. I took my photos at Balanced Rock and biked across the road to the picnic area and pulled out my computer to work on my blogs. I am pretty beat. I have no real appetite tonight. Not because of the heat or anything, I am just sick of the same food over and over everyday. I am eating cookies and nuts hoping I am not hungry enough to eat super tonight. I am camping in the very same place I camped coming into Arches NP two nights ago.

Balanced Rock

Tomorrow I only have the (short) Park Avenue trail and then I will head back to Dave and Jana Knowles to edit the over 2,000+ photos taken since I left their place April 29.

Balanced Rock

May 5
Km’s Pedalled – 39.5 km’s

Destination – Moab

Some Notes – A very sunny and hot day with no clouds. I broke camp early and visited Park Place trail on my way out of Arches NP. What can I say about Arches National Park? As with all of Utah – beautiful! Arches NP is a pretty spectacular place to visit. A fair bit of hiking if you want to see everything and for a cyclist a few demanding hills to climb but worth the effort.

I stopped for groceries and supplies in town on my back to my hosts the Knowles.

This afternoon and evening I managed to organize and edit all my photos up to Arches NP. I went to bed at 1am.

May 6
Some Notes- I started the morning with a Road Show with Brandon. Portions of my day were wasted with issues unrelated to my bike ride. Making an appointment for my first of 2 vaccine shots, dealing with my computer internet security billing issue and dealing with a Bookings.com billing issue. But I did manage to get all my photos edited and into Dropbox by the end of the day/night. I went to bed at 1am again.

May 7
Some Notes – I started the day with a short hike with my host Jana’s parents on one of their dog walks to Mill Creek. From there my day became fairly productive with posting blog posts Utah Part 4 & 5. I also finished and scheduled a birthday blog post called “48 of the coolest places that I have actually visited in my 48 years.” I also got all my recent 2,813 photos uploaded to Flickr. My new current bike ride total has me posting 21,279 photos to Flickr. I went to bed at 12:30 am.

Mill Creek

May 8
Some Notes – My day started with a bike trip to town for my first vaccine shot. I mainly getting the shot simply because I don’t want issues at future border crossing on this bike ride.

Getting back, I sprayed a can of de-greaser all over my bike chain and cassette to clean off all the sand that has accumulated since entering the desert when I left LA. And then I worked in front of my computer including scheduling 35 future Instagram posts.

May 9
Km’s Pedalled – 26 km’s hike and bike

Some Notes – A lazy largely uneventful day. At the suggestion of Dave my host I biked and hiked a trail at Sand Flat Recreational Area. It’s amazing how diverse Utah’s landscapes are no matter where in the state you go. Utah never disappoints.

Sand Flat Recreational Area

May 10
Km’s Pedalled – 91 km’s

Destination – Less then 10 km’s south of Monticello

Some Notes – I am back on the road and of note I biked past Wilson’s Arch.

Wilson Arch

Today was a long tough day. All day was up and down hills and up a few mountains. A cool (almost cold) overcast day with a crosswind pretty much all day. Three quarters of the way through the day a light rain started. I pushed through with getting into my rain gear. It’s been a while since I pushed this far.

Hwy 191 continues to be busy and the shoulders have some pretty bad sections moving south. I really don’t like this highway very much.

I received an email that my magazine article I did was published today. You can read it HERE.