Road Trip 2015 (Arches and Bryce National Parks and the Grand Canyon)

Well, it has been a rather eventful past several days... I've now been home for three days, but last Monday through late Thursday night, I was essentially constantly on the road. I went with my boyfriend (now fiancé) to three national parks in four days, and two of those days were essentially all driving.  It was tiring since we got up at 4 a.m. nearly every day of our trip, but was also awesome.

Our long trek started in Omaha on Monday morning, and we spent the better part of the day driving all the way to Moab, UT.  The Nebraska portion was quite easy-going, but Colorado and Utah made us nervous.  Not only were these stretches of Interstate winding and treacherous, but the amount of towns and houses gradually decreased as we continued west.  I've never considered Nebraska a highly populated state, but I do feel like we have considerably more spread out population than Western Colorado or Utah.  Particularly as we approached Moab, cell service was nonexistent and there wasn't a farm house to be seen.  It was unnerving, and I REALLY didn't want a car breakdown at that point.

This is what the road looked like when we initially entered Utah.  This did not inspire a lot of confidence that we were going the right direction.  There were so few other cars, we thought we took a wrong turn somewhere.

This was the winding highway along the Colorado River we had to drive as we got closer to Moab.  I was extremely nervous.  I'm used to flat, straight roads, and this didn't even have guardrails in most places.

Once we got safely to our hotel in Moab, we took the night to chill out a bit and walk the town.  It was clearly a tourist town.  The entire town seemed like it was composed of hotels, restaurants, and souvenir shops.  I'm also fairly certain we heard every language possible while we were there, so it's obviously a destination people from far and wide seek.  

The next day, we got up and continued to Arches National Park in darkness.  Our goal was to get a sunrise shot involving Delicate Arch.  However, our brochure lied to us and Delicate Arch viewpoint, well, sucked.  I don't know why it would be considered a good photography spot...there was really no view to see.  Fortunately, the sunrise was pretty underwhelming, so I wasn't upset that our initial location failed.  Instead, we drove up to a trail that was supposed to take us directly up to Delicate Arch for a closer view.  The trail was surprisingly difficult, and we found ourselves sweating profusely before the sun had even emerged.  

The most shocking portion of the trek was when my boyfriend and I found a mini arch on the way and climbed up into it for photos.  While I was busying myself taking photos, my sneaky boyfriend pulled out a ring and proposed.  Naturally, I accepted and was rather impressed with his ability to surprise me and pick such a picturesque place to do it.  I was also thrilled no witnesses were present.  I'm not a public, embarrassing proposal type of person, so I appreciated that greatly.

The ring and view from our engagement spot.

Following the proposal, we continued to Delicate Arch.  It was spectacular, to be frank.  I can definitely see why it's the most popular in the park.  Due to our earlyness, we were able to sit and enjoy the spot for about a half hour with only handful of other travelers.  We watched others take pictures and even took pictures for a few people.  One particular group of French Canadians was trying to get a shot under the arch using a self timer.  After watching a guy barely miss the snap following him sprinting down a dangerous cliff face, I volunteered to take the shot for him rather than watch him fall to his death....   That sure would have ruined my engagement day.  

Once we felt satisfied with our time with the arch, we climbed back down.  There were literally hordes of tourists making their way up the hill, so I was thrilled that we had managed to get up there before others.  Considering the difficulty of the trail, I also had to shake my head at all of the people dragging their poor children up the hill.  They really didn't understand what they were getting into...    The rest of the time, we did a few other hikes (such as the Broken Arch trail) and did a few drivebys.  I haven't included all of the photos since I have so many.

This giant bird we thought was the largest crow we had ever seen.  Turns out it's a raven....

Delicate Arch

Taking photos at Delicate Arch.  My fiancé snapped this picture while I was busy.

Because we came out to the park so early, we were able to leave in early afternoon to gas up the car and head to Flagstaff, AZ.  I'm not going to lie, while there was some cool scenery, that's a fairly boring and frustrating drive.  There are essentially no radio stations, no stopovers, and it was an irritating two-lane highway.   Nothing is worse than getting stuck behind someone's "Minnie Winnie" RV and having to travel 20 miles per hour below the speed limit....  Slow RVs aside, we made it to Flagstaff with little trouble.  Similar to the previous day, we checked into our hotel, ate, and crashed at the hotel.  Really all I did that night was edit some photos and call my mom to talk to her more about the engagement.  

The next morning, we hauled ourselves out of bed at 4 a.m....again.  This time, the park was not nearly as close to town, so there was an hour drive to get to the Grand Canyon.  My fiancé and I were confused by the fact that everything looked rather forest-y on the drive (we were picturing much more desert-like conditions).  We were equally shocked when we walked up to the railing at the park and saw the largest and most impressive canyon ever.... I couldn't believe the height and overall enormity of the place.  It also made me spectacularly nervous, especially since there was little railing and random dropoffs at many places.  I spent equal amounts of time taking pictures and yelling at my fiancé to get back from the edge.  

For the Grand Canyon, we chose to forego any hiking.  We wanted to make sure our short trip stayed on schedule, so we only hit the major viewpoints before heading off to Hatch, UT.  The drive was considerably more desert-like as we headed north than coming up from the south.  I spent most of it editing photos, which helped pass the time a bit.  In order to break up the drive, we did decided to stop at Horseshoe Bend, a popular photography area on the Colorado River.  I think it's safe to say that this place was really awesome, but also insanely terrifying.  There were no fences or guard rails, just crazy people hanging out on the edge of a 500-foot drop.  I was nervous the entire time, though I did get a couple good shots.  I think I would have turned right back around if not for the desire to get a photo.  People, including my fiancé, were just way too comfortable with walking up to unprotected cliff edges for my taste.  Even thinking about it gives me anxiety....

As we approached Hatch, UT, the only other stop we made was at Best Friends Animal Sanctuary.  It was essentially a giant Humane Society with thousands of acres and great views in Kanab, UT.  We missed the tours, but were able to drive around a bit.  It was beautiful, and though the extensive animal cemetery was sad, I'm sure the animals have an extremely happpy and peaceful life at this place even if they don't get adopted.

Not long after hitting up the animal sanctuary, we arrived in Hatch, UT at our quaint little hotel.  Though we were initially planning to go to Bryce Canyon in the morning, we decided to make our driving hours the next day more reasonable by going that night.  We left Hatch and headed for the canyon about 30 minutes away.  After a little souvenir shopping, we headed into the canyon.  Immediately, we encountered wildlife, which had been relatively scarce at the other parks other than a few lizards, birds, and squirrels.  A mule deer doe was eating on the side of the road at the park entrance.  She literally walked towards our car, barely flinched when an RV passed, and walked right across the road.  Later, we saw a doe and fawn do the same thing.  Our car was 10 feet away and they didn't move or even acknowledge our presence.  Nebraska deer just don't DO that....

Anyway, Bryce Canyon was spectacular in a completely different way from Arches or the Grand Canyon.  It was bright orange and looked like some kind of orange layer cake with spikes.  It was strange, but very cool.  We WERE able to hike down into this canyon on a 1.5 mile trek that felt like five miles.  You had to watch your footing on the sloping, staircase-like trails, and the way up was at such a steep grade that you were winded before long. I thought I was in shape before this trip, but the hiking taught me that climbing directly up is clearly not something I do often....

To round out our trip, we stayed until dark.  We had read that Bryce Canyon gets incredibly dark at night, and we wanted to try our hand at stargazing and astrophotography.  Initially, we wanted to stay up at Inspiration Point (the highest level) to wait for the stars.  However, we got a little creeped out, and decided to go to our car in the parking lot below.  Despite annoying people continuing to drive up with their brights on around the parking lot, I did get a few decent pictures.  I've never taken any pictures of the night sky before, so I was pretty pleased with my first attempt.  There was a new moon, so the stars were especially bright without the moon shining so brightly.

The next morning...once again around 4 a.m....we set out for Nebraska.  My fiancé (like the night before on our drive back to Hatch), was on edge for the first couple hours before light.  It gets dark in a way we've never experienced before, so it made for nervous driving.  Sunrise also sucked since we were headed back East.  For one terrifying moment, the rising sun completely blinded us on the interstate as we climbed a steep hill.  After an anxious moment, our entire day consisted of stopping to fuel up and switch drivers.  We made a stopover in Grand Island at my parents house to stretch our legs and drop off/pick up a few things, but it was a pretty straight-through drive.  By the time we got back to Omaha, I'm relatively certain neither of us ever wanted to see a car again.

Anyway, despite the excruciating amount of driving on lonely highways, the trip was more than worth it.  I'd be happy to go to all three parks again, but not until I forget how long the drive was!  Besides, the fact that I got engaged at Arches National Park almost makes it a requirement that I go back at some point....