The plan was to drive to Valley of the Gods in southeast Utah near the Four Corners region
where Utah, Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico all come together.We would spend Friday night at
Valley of the Gods Bed
and Breakfast, a delightful-looking place we had discovered
online that is within driving distance of the region's most
spectacular natural attractions such as
Monument Valley, Lake Powell in the
Glen Canyon National
Recreation Area, Mesa Verde
National Park, Arches
National Park, and
Canyonlands National Park. Saturday we would search out a campsite.
We had planned this camping trip for two months, knowing that early
October is dependably dry, warm in the daytime and cool at night,
and decked out with glorious fall colors. However, we awoke to
pouring rain the morning of our departure and just hoped that it
would soon stop and dry out. I can’t say we were undaunted—but we
were cautiously optimistic—as we packed the van and headed
north from Sedona.
Passing through Tuba City we saw several
telephone poles snapped off at ground level, many low-lying spots in the road
recently cleared of mud and debris, and innumerable large and small puddles from
the previous night’s violent thunderstorms. This did not bode well for our
long-awaited excursion…
But as we drove and the hours passed, our hopes rose along with the
slowly clearing skies.
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Mexican Hat Rock |
We checked into the B&B and, with blue showing through the late afternoon clouds, we
ventured
into the small town of Mexican Hat for dinner. As the famous Mexican Hat rock
formation came into view we did the ‘tourist thing’ and stopped for the obvious
photo op. Our intended destination was the Mexican Hat Lodge, “Home of the
Swinging Steaks,” cooked on an outdoor barbeque.
We thought the outdoor BBQ would be closed due to the
weather, but we lucked out and the wood fire was a-blazin’. The 18oz.
steaks looked tempting but at a pricey $30 each, we opted for burgers with pinto
beans, Texas toast (a variation on garlic bread), and salad, celebrating our victory over the rain with a wine
cooler and a beer. The burgers were a full pound of ground meat, cooked slowly
over the wood fire on a grill suspended above it, swung slowly back and forth
over the heat. Certainly not gourmet fare but wood-fire tasty and filling.
Sitting outside at the
BBQ’s bar we couldn’t help overhearing various conversations
regarding the unexpected fall storms of the past day and night. A
bridge was out in nearby Hanksville; people were stranded; some
folks lost their car and travel trailer in a flash flood—and we were
planning to camp? But surely it would clear up, dry out, and
the weekend would develop into everything we wanted it to be… right?
After dinner we headed
back to the B&B, spent the night in the last really comfortable bed
we’d see for days, and departed on Saturday morning with blue skies
and high hopes.
Being a painter, my husband, Wolfgang, has had a
years-long love affair with this part of Utah and knew exactly
where we should spend Saturday night.
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San Juan River |
From the B&B, we drove for
about 12 miles onto the San Juan Rim in the Glen Canyon National
Recreation area and turned left onto a mere trail that we followed
for nearly a hundred yards until it just…stopped…at the edge of a
cliff.
The cliff dropped nearly 1800 feet, offering fantastic views
of the canyons of the San Juan River—the river itself was not quite
visible from our vantage point. We pitched camp about 30 feet from
the rim. Off to our right and some distance away was Muley Point.
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Muley
Point |
We
could see the twisting, winding, storm-battered excuse for a road
that led up, up, up, finally disappearing around a tight bend. From
the Muley Point Overlook, the San Juan River, Monument Valley, and
the desert beyond would be visible but we were afraid the van might
not survive that particular adventure.
Cedar Mesa, the cliff
that towers high above Valley of the Gods, rose 1,100 feet into the
air behind us, beyond the road on which we came. Occasionally,
sizable rocks loosened by the latest driving rains would bounce down
its side, creating thunder with their abrupt descents. It was
startling, to say the least, when these bouncing boulders
surrendered to gravity, but we knew a hundred yards was distant
enough to be out of harm’s way.
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Wolfgang Lehnhardt
painting |
My artist husband
immediately set up his painting table and eagerly engrossed himself
in his passion.
I was content with the sunshine and
a good book.
Later in the day we hiked for several miles along the
dirt road that led up to Muley Point, taking in the views, the
solitude, and the sheer immensity of these wide open spaces—both
horizontal and vertical. I was almost mesmerized by the
silence—nothing but the sigh of the wind, the shriek of a soaring
hawk, the crunch of the gravel under our shoes…
After a simple dinner,
the warm afternoon temperatures quickly plummeted to cool, and then,
as the wind picked up, coldly walloped our unprotected cliff-site.
We retired early, diving into the cozy sleeping bags in the back of
the van, grateful to escape the merciless wind.
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View from
campsite |
We awoke early Sunday
morning to discover that although the sun was shining on our
immediate area, clouds were piling up rather ominously off in the
distance. We decided to head in the direction of Lake Powell where
the sky was blue and inviting.
After breakfast, we bumped along the
dirt road back to the Moki Dugway, an unpaved roller-coaster of a
road with spectacular views. It rose over 1,100 feet in only 2
miles, the tight switchbacks a challenge, with many portions of the
road edge washed out from the recent torrential rains—and not a
guard rail in sight.
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Moki
Dugway |
Constructed in 1958 by
the mining company Texas Zinc, the Moki Dugway was used to transport
uranium ore from the "Happy Jack" mine in Fry Canyon, UT, to the
processing mill in Mexican Hat. The term "mokee" or “moki” is
derived from the Spanish word “moqui,” which was used
by the 18th century Spanish explorers and settlers to describe the
Pueblo Indians (now Hopi) they encountered.The Moki Dugway led us
up to Muley Point at the top of Cedar Mesa and we found ourselves
looking down on the cliff where we had spent the previous night. The
expansive vista included Monument Valley with its many extraordinary
rock formations, the extremely muddy San Juan River and its numerous
canyons, sacred Navajo Mountain, and the huge, coal-bearing Black
Mesa. The sheer enormity of the panorama made us feel humble and
very insignificant.
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Slot
Canyon hike |
Leaving Muley Point we
drove across Cedar Mesa, passing Grande Gulch—an area rich in
Anasazi ruins—and traveled Utah 95 for about an hour, one of the
most scenic routes in the state. We crossed the Colorado and
Dirty Devil rivers at Lake Powell and took 276 south toward Lake
Powell’s Bullfrog Marina. We stopped at a couple overlooks to enjoy
the views, and then decided to go for a hike.We crossed the highway
and scrambled down a short embankment into a wash; the floor
gradually sloped downward until the walls rose up nearly 30 or 40
feet on either side. My husband knew the area well and told
me
we were hiking a slot canyon known as Maidenwater. In places,
the canyon was very narrow but most of the time it was at least 10
feet wide, shady and cool—a perfect place to hike on a hot, sunny
afternoon. There were countless concretions in the canyon, unusual
rocky ‘growths’ on many of the rocks. And in several areas the
canyon walls had eroded into interesting, almost cavern-like
structures supported by natural, solid rock columns.
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"Concretion" |
Two tired hours later,
we turned back, loathe to leave this geologically fascinating hike,
but anxious to locate the night’s campsite before dark. We drove on
to a place called Starr Springs and again followed a dirt road that
turned off a dirt road to an even more remote dirt road, up and over
a few hills and suddenly another breathtaking view stopped us in our
tracks. This was it!A mountain behind us;
a couple others defining the horizon; Lake Powell a distant mirror
reflecting the sun’s brilliance; and large, rolling hills in the
immediate foreground—I simply didn’t know where to look first! As we
set up camp, coyotes yipped and howled in far valleys, their
sing-song voices carrying in the quiet vastness.
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View from
our campsite |
We prepared and ate a
quick dinner, finishing up as the setting sun painted the sky first
with gold, then various shades of orange, pink, and purple, enhanced
by the fluffy clouds that captured the ever-changing hues. Once the
sun set, the temperature dropped abruptly and we again crawled into
our cozy sleeping bags in the van—our dreamland almost as beautiful
as the actual countryside in which we slept.
Monday morning brought
another surprise—colder temperatures, snow on the distant mountain
peaks, heavy cloud cover above, and a definite threat of imminent
rain. The soil in this area was predominantly bentonite clay that
would become extremely slippery, hazardous, and nearly impassable in
a heavy downpour, so we skipped breakfast and packed up the van. It
was time to depart!
We had barely left the
campsite before scattered raindrops splatted on the windshield,
but we made it to pavement before it started coming down in earnest.
We arrived home safely and
eager to sleep in our own bed once again.It was a grand
adventure and we consider ourselves lucky to have dodged the
majority of the weekend’s raindrops. And we now know that early
October isn’t always dependably dry and warm!