Author: danleeth

Heading for Home

Dianne’s meetings finally ended and I finished the latest Craig Childs book. We had a final Las Vegas dinner with our LifeVantage friends, Rick and Therese, at Smokey Joe’s in the Sam’s Town Casino atrium. [Dianne said the ribs were better at Duke’s in Hanksville.]

Sunday morning, we got up hideously early, drained the trailer, loaded up everything and were eventually ready to depart. A mere three hours after crawling out of bed, we were on the road. Leaving Las Vegas was the absolute highlight of the trip.

We motored from Nevada into Arizona (Virgin River Gorge) and up into Utah. Our destination for the evening was the KOA in Richfield, Utah.

There, we were given a really nice site complete with trees, picnic table and a fire ring, which we will use later tonight.

This KOA is almost like real camping. What we did at the KOA in Las Vegas was definitely NOT camping!

A glass of wine. A flaming campfire. This is camping.

After a no rush Monday morning, we hooked Whitey up to Tighty and drove the familiar I-70 route toward home.

Along the way, we made a scenic pottty stop at the Ghost Rock Overlook…

…and, of course, a bacon-cheesburger lunch stop at Ray’s Tavern in Green River.

Ninety miles later, we arrived home and began unloading – the unfun part of every camping trip.

In three weeks, we’ll be loading up again for yet another camping trip.

Off to Zion

 

And we’re off again, this time taking the Subaru on our annual winter pilgrimage to Zion National Park. 

The nice thing about winter in Zion is that we can drive where we want and not have to take these damn shuttle busses around.

 First stop on the drive was for lunch at Mom’s Café in Salina, Utah.

 We first stopped here years ago and were unimpressed with the menu at the time.  This year, we opted for conventional road food.  I enjoyed a double bacon cheeseburger that was pretty damn good.

 We turned down U.S. 89 and entered the park on the Zion-Mount Carmel Highway.  A herd of bighorn sheep greeted us at a roadside potty stop.

 It was late afternoon by the time we approached the Virgin River Canyon with the nearby cliffs blushing in the late afternoon sunlight.

We turned up the canyon to the lodge where we got keys to our cabin where we would bunk for the next four nights.

We had two full-size beds, a gas fireplace, a small desk and unlike a few years ago, the cabins now have decent Wi-Fi coverage.   

Best of all, the view from our cabin was delightful.

Hike to Emerald Pools

Our first hike on this trip was one we’ve done on previous winter visits to Zion. We would walk to the three Emerald Pools. The trailhead lies across the river from the lodge.

It’s a relatively easy hike with most of the route on a paved trail.

There are three pools. We began with Lower Emerald Pool, which had a bit of snow and ice around it.

Next came Middle Emerald Pool, it’s surface mirroring the cliffs across the river.

And finally, we reached Upper Emerald Pool.

That night at dinner, I kept hoping that Jesus would stop by and turn this into wine, but that didn’t happen.

The Watchman

Our final day in Zion, we decided to do something new and hike the Watchman Trail, which begins at the visitor center.

It offers a scenic route up the cliffs behind the visitor center…

…with nice views of the cliffs across the valley.

The trail was well maintained, complete with steps…

And retaining walls.

The trail topped out, offering view of the Watchman.

Long Way Home

All good things must finally come to an end. We had two routes we could take to get home. One would have involved around 350 miles of freeway driving. The other would take us on a scenic drive through familiar Southeast Utah backcountry.

We, of course, chose the backcountry. Our first stop was in the town of Mt. Carmel Junction where we had breakfast at the Thunderbird Restaurant. Over the years, I’ve stopped here with every one of my wives and handful of girlfriends, but never together.

We next turned down Scenic Byway 12 and headed for a quick visit of Bryce Canyon.

From there, we continued on through Escalante to Boulder…

…where we turned down the Burr Trail…

…which we followed to the Notom-Bullfrog Road in Capitol Reef National Park.

We continued south to the marina town of Bullfrog in the Glen Canyon National Recreation Area.

From there, it was on Stan’s gas station and “Burger Shak” in Hanksville for fuel and milkshakes.

From there, continued on to I-70, which we followed through the San Rafael Reef…

…and on to home.

Death Valley Days

Part two of our autumn “vacation” began about three hours late. Dianne was in Dallas attending a LifeVantage meeting, and her flight back to civilization arrived three hours late in the Grand Valley.

I picked her up at the Grand Junction International Airport, we rushed home by way of Jimmy Johns, ate our sandwiches, loaded the car and headed to Richfield, Utah, where we had reservations at the beautiful Super 8 Motel there.

Heading in a westward direction, we were treated to a stunning Utah sunset.

Super 8 Motels provide their guests with free breakfast.

Of course, this was NOT the Super 8 breakfast. We drove down Main Street to the Black Bear Diner and ate there. Much better.

Back on the road, we left Utah, skirted through North Las Vegas and headed for Death Valley.

Taking advantage of discounts offered by Xanterra, we booked two nights at The Ranch at Death Valley.

We were bunking in a duplex cottage suite…

…with a separate living room and bedroom

…and a great front porch to enjoy by day…

…and night.

I really, really like this place. We originally had a two night stay booked, but Dianne allowed me to add a third.

We wandered around the Ranch, checking out its open-air museum of artifacts from the Death Valley borax production days…

…and its fine dining options.

With the government shutdown, many of the places we wanted to explore were not open. We did find a few interesting sites to check out, however, including…

…the remains of the Harmony Borax Works…

…the view of Bad Water from Dante’s View overlook…

…and Zabriskie Point at sunset.

We also explored the Inn at Death Valley, the more upscale Xanterra property located nearby…

…where we had dinner reservations…

…with prickly pear margaritas…

…followed by steaks and wine.

After three nights at the Ranch, we set off for Nevada, Our route followed the eastern escarpment of the Sierra through California, passing by Mt. Whitney, highest peak in the Lower 48 states. I’ve climbed it a couple of times.

In Bishop, we stopped at Erick Schat’s Bakery for lunch.

This place has long been a mandatory stop for a loaf or two of their excellent cheese bread.

Continuing north, we passed Mono Lake…

…and continued into Carson City where we are staying in a Bed without Breakfast house next door to Dianne’s sister’s home.

We’ll be going from 190 feet below sea level to 4,687 feet above. I hope we survive the thin air.

Birthday Celebration

The reason we came to Nevada was to celebrate Dianne’s father’s 100th birthday, her mother’s 94th birthday and their 75th wedding anniversary.

To celebrate these events, the offspring reserved the clubhouse at their housing development and invited around 75 family and friends to attend, most of whom actually showed up.

Of course, we had to take a shot of just members of the family, which included children, grand children, great grand children and now one great-great grandchild.

While some of the family still live in western Nevada, others had to fly in from Tennessee and Kentucky, while others drove here from Oregon, California, Idaho and, of course, Colorado. A good time was had by all.

Heading Home

Monday, morning – time to leave our guest home.

The house sits next to Dianne’s sister’s home and while the owners are in Portugal, they allow members of the sister’s family to stay there. Of course, we never got to meet the owners, but I think we would like them.

I wish we had brought a bottle of some good Colorado wine to leave with them, but we seldom take the good stuff on the road.

Our route back to God’s Country took us across Nevada on U.S. Highway 50, the loneliest road in America.

It’s mostly 70 mph two-lane with an occasional turn.

We made a quick stop in the town of Eureka, one of the few outposts of civilization along the route.

Across the street from the Opera House sits the jail where my lovely wife revisited the spot where she spent some time in her younger days.

We continued into Ely, where Dianne’s nephew gave us a free room in a motel he now owns.

While the room was clean and comfortable, we did have to put up with a bit of road construction out front.

The next day, we headed out past Wheeler Peak and Great Basin National Park…

…and into Utah…

Where, of course, we stopped at Ray’s Tavern…

…for bacon cheese burgers and a glass of evolution amber beer.

Ninety miles later, we arrived at home…

…where a full beaver super moon soon poked through the naked cottonwood trees behind our patio.

When Plans go Wrong

I spent several days planning, organizing and reserving sites for a month-long trailer camping trip beginning in Utah before heading to Joshua Tree and Death Valley National Parks and then up to Nevada for my father-in-law’s 100th birthday.

Then the government shut down.  We got a notice from Joshua Tree that our reserved campground would be closed for 2/3 of the days we would be there.  I could work around that, but we were worried about what else might close or be closed for our planned visits.  Making the best of the situation, we cancelled everything, eating over $100 in cancellation fees.

Instead, we kept our reservation at an RV park outside Capitol Reef National Park where we would be hiking with other members of the Colorado Mountain Club.  Then we made reservations for a three-day stay in an RV park in Hanksville, Utah, where we planned to do some photography.  From there, we would head to Green River for three days.