IntrepidXJ's Adventure Weblog

This morning Amanda and I set off to do some hiking at the Colorado National Monument. Our first destination was the Liberty Cap trail. This is a trail we had not been on before. We started at the bottom and planned to head up to the Liberty Cap before heading back down, however after climbing about 500 feet on the trail, the ice and mud got too slick, so we ended up turning around.

Since we didn’t complete that trail, we decided to head over and check out Echo Canyon, since we haven’t been back there for a while.

View up No Thoroughfare Canyon

This way to Echo Canyon

We hiked about halfway6 up Echo Canyon until we stopped at a slickrock area that had water running through it and a few small waterfalls. We just sat down and relaxed here and listened to the running water. It was very relaxing.

My shadow over a pothole full of water

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February 15, 2010

My goal for President’s Day was to head out to Moab and to find some geocaches. However, there was more snow and ice around Moab than I had hoped for, which killed that idea, as I was not about to go digging in ice and snow looking for geocaches. I had started out on the Cotter Mine Road hoping to find some caches near the Monitor & Merrimac Buttes, but when I reached the turnoff, I quickly found out that it had not been traveled.

Along the Cotter Mine Road

Instead of breaking through the icy snow, I decided to loop around back to the highway and head to Arches National Park. When I arrived at the park, I made my way towards The Organ, where I parked my Jeep and started hiking up the Park Avenue trail.

Three Gossips and Baby Arch

Three Gossips

The Organ

Park Avenue

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February 13 – 14, 2010

For the weekend following my birthday, I wanted to head back to Capitol Reef National Park. When I was there back in October, I noted a couple of hikes I wanted to check out and figured this would be a good time.

After driving through some thick fog early Saturday morning, we arrived at Capitol Reef and started on our first short hike up to Hickman Bridge.

After climbing above the Fremont River looking back at Capitol Dome with the road below.

Hickman Bridge

On our way back from the Hickman Bridge, we stopped at the Nels Johnson Bridge

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I just got back a little while ago from my first skiing class at Powderhorn. I’m happy to report that I survived and had a good time. Only two more days to go!

Here’s a few quick pictures I snapped while I was on the lift…

Now it’s time to hop in the Jacuzzi before I get sore

Heading to Arches National Park on the weekend closest to Christmas seems to be a tradition that Amanda and I are starting. Hopefully we can keep it up in the future

On Sunday, we got up early and made our way to Arches. The sun started to rise as we neared the park, and it appeared that it was going to be a nice clear day. Unfortunately, by the time we reached Devils Garden, the clouds had rolled in. We quickly made the hike to Landscape Arch and took a few photos.

We had wanted to head over to Double O Arch, but with about a foot of snow on the ground in the park, the trail was very slick and difficult. Since I didn’t want to fall and break my camera gear, I decided it would be best if we headed back when the snow melts off. Instead we headed back to Tunnel Arch and Pine Tree Arch before heading back to our car.

The sky did get a little more interesting on our way back

Tunnel Arch

Near Pine Tree Arch

Sky through Pine Tree Arch

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Ever since we got that big snow a few weeks back, I have been wanting to get out and try out my snowshoes near home to get some practice with them before I head up into the mountains. Today was the first opportunity I had to give them a try, so I headed up to the Bangs Canyon area and used them for a few hours. It was a good workout

Grand Mesa in the background and the Grand Valley below

My tracks

Shadow

It was a great morning for a hike. I wanted to get out of the house for a little while this morning and try out my new Merrell Snowmotion boots. When we were at the Colorado National Monument last Sunday, I remembered noticing that the Alcove Nature Trail near the Visitor’s Center was covered with snow and no one had been on it yet. Since I have never hiked that short trail yet, I figured it would be a good place to test them out.

Tracks in the snow

My new boots performed great

Dead end in the alcove at the end of the trail

Self portrait

I was a good way to start the day. I’m hoping to get out tomorrow and get a little snowshoeing in

Since I was home all day yesterday, I needed to get outside for at least a little while today. We headed to the Colorado National Monument and hiked the Canyon Rim and Window Rock trails near the visitor’s center. Here’s a few pictures Amanda and I took along the way.

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Sunday, November 29, 2009

After a good nights sleep we left Green River and made our way to the White Wash Sand Dunes via the Ruby Ranch Road. When we reached White Wash, we followed the sandy wash around the dunes in the area. Then Amanda took over driving and drove over a few small dunes along the wash.

White Wash

Wide well traveled wash

After playing around in the sand, we continued on past Red Wash and arrived back at the Tenmile Point Road. From there we made our way to the Dubinky Well Road again and cut across Deadman Mesa to reach Spring Canyon Bottom.

My original goal was to finish the Hey Joe Canyon trail, however when we reached Spring Canyon Bottom, there was a slow moving Jeep heading down the trail and I was feeling impatient. Instead, we took a left at the intersection and followed around the Bowknot Bend of the Green River the other direction. It was a little narrow and washed out in places, but still very drivable.

After heading back from the Bowknot Bend, we made our way to Moab to have some lunch at the Moab Brewery. From there we headed home across the Dolores Triangle where Amanda was excited to drive my Jeep across the Dolores River.

It was a nice relaxing weekend after Thanksgiving and Black Friday.

Saturday, November 28, 2009

Since Amanda had to work on Black Friday, we had to wait until Saturday before we could head anywhere on the Thanksgiving weekend. There were some trails north of Moab that I had been wanting to check out for a while and we didn’t want to head too far away from home, so we ended up heading that way for the weekend. Our main destination would be the Crystal Geyser near Green River, but we would of course take the long way there

We took I-70 to the Floy Wash exit just past Crescent Junction and headed south on the Ruby Ranch Road. We took a left onto the Blue Hills Road and then turned off onto the Dubinky Well Road. After looping around Tombstone Rock we started our first trail of the day….Rainbow Terrace (aka Rainbow Rocks). Since I’ve been on this trail before, Amanda drove the whole thing.

You can see the colors in the rocks above this trail.

After finishing the trail we headed west to Tenmile Point above the Green River.

Amanda taking a break from driving

After taking in the views, we headed back to the start off the Crystal Geyser trail.

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