Canyonlands/Arches National Parks 2015

This year i had to go on a couple of business trips to Colorado and Utah. I did most of that in the Spring and last Fall but this summer i broke my toe so i wasn't able to do any hiking in Alaska. My friend Jimmy happened to have some vacation piled up that he needed to take so we decided to go on a road trip form L.A. through Utah to Colorado, where i arranged some more business to take care of.

The Shafer jeep trail will take you down to the spectacular White Rim Trail.

At first there were about 4 areas of showers we were avoiding. I thought it would clear up after that but it got much worse.

Jimmy taking in the Green River Canyon

Jimmy had never done very much in Utah so the trip was a chance for me to show him some of my favorite places along the way. After a long drive from L.A. to Beaver on July 3rd (don't travel on the road on July 3rd between L.A. and Vegas, trust me), we showed up in Moab on the 4th.

We had enough time on that day to visit Canyonlands in the evening. We went to the Islands in the Sky district and we spent most of the time trying to dodge thundershowers. I had hoped to not get stuck in a thundershower and we were lucky enough to experience just enough rain to keep us cool in the heat (it was 104F in Moab that day). Afterwards though, on the drive back we experienced torrential rain and hail, and witnessed one of the biggest lightening storms of our lives.

Two of what seemed like 3,000 bolts we saw.

The lightning lasted for several hours with near constant strikes occurring in every direction. At one point we even saw a small Juniper tree on fire right after it was struck! The downside for the rain was that we didn't get a good sunset but on the plus side the lightning was amazing.

Arriving back in Moab at 10pm the rain and lightning showed no signs of letting up but that didn't stop the town from putting on their Fourth of July fireworks display. The show in Moab is really good for the size of the town! As good as the show was, the lightning seriously diminished it's impact, absolutely dwarfing the expensive fireworks.

A few days later we read in the paper that that night of rain was a record breaker for the Moab area and by the end of that week they had received 3/4 of their rain for the entire month!

I heard some people complain about the weather but the rain in Canyonlands is a special event. It stencils out the layers of canyons and adds depth. The mountain in the distance is one of the Henry Mountains.

Oddly enough the only two times i've been to Canyonlands the weather was "bad". See what it looked like when i was here in the snow.

The Three Gossips stand on the left in Arches National Park.

Our second day in Moab was spent in the Needles District but back in Moab that evening we still had time to head over to Arches to try out sunset again. We were tired after an arduous Jeep ride but the visit was worth the trip. Just before sunset the sun peaked out below the clouds (there were thundershowers that night too) and cast an intense glow across the park for about 10 minutes.

The orange stone of Arches looks great against the sky in the last rays of daylight.

Jimmy explores what i think is just called The North Window.

Turret Arch. As a 20 year old i climbed up there and bruised my heel jumping off of it.

You can sort of see how low the sun had to get before it came out of the clouds. We almost didn't get a sunset at all, but those can turn out to be the best ones.