Canyonlands National Park

As the souvenir T-shirt says – Utah Rocks – a clever play on words. We have now visited the 2nd rocky national park – Canyonlands. It has 3 separate sections. The Maze is remote and accessible only by foot or maybe 4WD – Butch Cassidy and his gang holed up for months evading capture by the police, who could not find their way through the maze of canyons and dead-ends. We spent Saturday in the Island in the Sky northern section, also visiting the nearby Dead Horse Point – amazing scenery. It was used for the final scene of the movie Thelma and Louise where the car plunges over the cliff of the (supposedly) Grand canyon into the Colorado River. Apparently the director was not happy with the 1st take so they catapulted a 2nd car into the river.

Dead Horse Point

Looking through Mesa Arch - Canyonlands

Looking through Mesa Arch - Canyonlands

Crusty soil full of living organisms - one footprint wipes out decades of growth!

Grandview Overlook - Canyonlands

Yesterday (Sunday) we drove 66 miles south to the Needles sections, a mass of vertical narrow tall rocks that look needle-like from afar. Unfortunately you need to do an 11 mile hike to really get up close and in amongst the Needles, so we drove on to Natural Bridges monument which has 3 large natural bridges (formed by water flowing underneath) unlike arches which form differently. The final effect looks similar though.

On the road to Natural Bridges - typical scenery

Owachomo Bridge - the largest in the park

Now we are in a lovely hotel in Cortez near Mesa Verde which we are visiting today. Of the 4 nights we spent in Moab 2 were in a deluxe cabin in an RV park and 2 were in our tent as Moab was quite full due to the Labour Day long weekend. So its lovely to be in a king bed in a super quiet hotel. We found out quite by accident that we save about 10% at most hotels by showing our RACV membership card.