Overload

We've been here in Bluff for 4 days now and we're on overload.    Who knew there were so many fantastic things to see here in this little corner of Utah?   Indian ruins of all sizes, ages,  petroglyphs, pictographs, fantastic sandstone monoliths, volcanic plugs, tiny spring flowers, historical sites, the silty San Juan river (sometimes rushing, sometimes trickling) smooth red jeep roads, rough jeep roads, cattle roaming freely, towering bluffs,  high plateaus, distant snow covered mountains, and on and on.

Friday Pam and John (our unofficial tour guides) took us across the street to the Fort Bluff Museum to see a short film about the Hole in The Rock expedition or the San Juan Mission.    A little known but inspirational story about a group of 250 Mormon men, women and children who followed the "call" to form a settlement in the four corners area of Utah in order to become a buffer between lawlessness and civilization.  They began their journey in November 1879. They weren't fleeing religious persecution, they weren't looking for monetary gain, they were making this arduous trail through mostly uncharted and extremely hostile land because they believed it was for the safety and good of the overall community.    An unbelievable story and one that I can't begin to do justice to.    You can either wait for John's rendition (ohtheplacestheygo.wordpress.com) or look it up for yourself if you're interested in learning about their trials and successes.

window in Fort Bluff

The road, a native surface road, to the base of San Juan Hill was a rough one.   Dave was impressed with John's jeep's performance on the rocky, up and down, sandy track.  

good thing John knew where the road was.....
and that we were in his jeep, not ours!

10 and 2.......what's over this hill?

Comb Ridge

Our task was to climb the hill in the tracks of the Mormon wagon train and see their ruts and their thankful carvings in the rocks along the way.    We looked and looked, we found ruts but those writings evaded us this time.    We're sure we passed them while we were watching our footings.   After seeing the movie and then experiencing the site of one of their challenges I didn't need to see their words to be affected by what they and their hard working animals had to have endured.

on the way to the top of the trail

higher and higher

looking back down the "trail" at the jeep far below
can you see it?

looking down to watch our footing gave us unexpected beauty

ruts of 100 wagons worn in the stone

bright Indian Paintbrush blooming
in the rocks

can you see the trail's scar running diagonally up to the top?

I almost slipped this rock into my pocket....I loved it!
but I resisted

Our day wasn't over yet.   We piled into the jeep and drove a bit more to a wonderful lunch spot.

Next post......

A few left over bits at Wahweap and on to Utah

Here are a few last pictures from Wahweap Campground, our boat trip and the Page area.    I'll add a few pictures as an addendum to the Wright's blog on our day on the water, but John did a stellar job and since we were together what they saw, we saw!   It was a most excellent experience.

We loaded our gear into a UTV shuttle for the ride down the bank to the Antelope Marina far below.    We could have walked down, but Dave and I had checked out the marina a few days before and we knew what kind of a walk we'd have.....

no, we didn't rent one of these lux houseboats.....
we could have, but chose not to

we elected John navigator, but eventually Pam stepped in

after she was finished.....

John enjoyed the ride but kept the
charts close at hand

We were lucky to be able to hire the senior captain from
Mr. David's Professional A-1 River Pilot Serivce
to guide us

preparing to beach our craft in a quiet cove

The remainder of our time in site 24 was spent doing odds and ends and staying out of the high winds that swept through our area.   We could see huge white caps on the Lake from our vantage point at the campground and were very happy we chose a calm and beautiful day for our day on the water.    The now familiar views took on a different feeling with the veil of dust and sand blowing in the air.

interesting cloud over the top of Navajo Mountain at dusk

Thursday we broke camp and drove about 170 miles north and east to our next stop in tiny Bluff, Utah.     On the way we drove through the magnificent and iconic Monument Valley.

This area is in the north east part of Arizona and on Navajo Indian Reservation.
Most of the way was open range, meaning cattle and horses may be present on the road at any time.    Many years ago we drove through the Valley with a young Jesse and Dave's mom after dark.   Not particularly smart, but we were on a time budget and had no choice in getting from point A to point B.      We saw many horses and cattle roaming across the road and sleeping on the shoulder and it was nerve wracking.     This time, thankfully, we only came across three young men sauntering across the highway.

himself taking his sweet time to cross the road

As we approached Bluff the rock formations appeared to have frosting pouring down from the top.    We're constantly amazed by the many types of rocks, sizes, shapes, colors, formations we've seen on our travels.

We're settled into our basic, gravel site at the Cadillac Ranch.   This is a very small (15 pull through sites), full hook up campground in the middle of the town of Bluff, population about 300.   There is a nice little pond full of coots and blackbirds in front of us and views of the bluffs behind.  

windshield view

bluffs behind Beluga

Its early spring here, as you can see by the leafless trees and Dave's winter jacket...we must disconnect our water hoses at night so they don't freeze.


Last night we joined John and Pam at a local restaurant.   I had Indian Fry Bread Pizza and it was fantastic!   The restaurant is modest but serves delicious food, is very close and you can't beat the backdrop!     We'll be back again, I'm sure!

Dave, Pam and John waiting for me at the aptly named Twin Rocks restaurant

suggestion

This morning we left beautiful Lake Powell, drove through magnificent Monument Valley and arrived at our next stop, the tiny town of Bluff, Utah.

Our internet capability here is also fairly limited, as it was at Lake Powell, so I probably won't be able to post any gorgeous pictures until at least Tuesday.  That's the day that our new trucker antenna is scheduled to arrive and that will, hopefully, boost our signal enough to get back to normal while we're out in these fairly remote places.

In the mean time, if you want to read a great blog about the day we shared a boat  on Lake Powell, check out John and Pam Wright's account at:

ohtheplacestheygo.wordpress.com   The heading of the boating post is
A Boat Ride On Lake Powell.

That's all for now.

catch up, part 2

We still have no internet over here at site 24 but John and Pam, next door, do.  While we were at their motorhome for happy hour/viewing of recorded first night of Dancing With The Stars hour, John offered his wifi password so I could reconnect with the outside world.....thanks John (and Pam).

So here is another installment of what we've been doing at Lake Powell, courtesy of the Wrights.

Back to Paria.....

the mesa is eroding slowly to reveal its true inner beauty

The next event of our day was to drive a few miles back towards Lake Powell, park  just off route 89 and walk through the hiker's gate to hike out to see the unusual rock formations called Toadstools.

discussing which trail to follow

a toadstool formation

Dave standing below for perspective on the toadstools size

two old mountain goats

John and Pam beneath two toadstools

can you see tiny Dave in front of the huge alcove?

Pam resting inside the alcove

what we don't do for our photographs

I think this is all I'm going to be able to show you tonight between Johns internet and ours......Here is a preview of our wonderful boat trip on Monday....