Arches National Park

We awoke to a light drizzle on Thursday morning, packed up for the day, and drove to Arches National Park, a little over five miles away.  This was our tenth National Park and the only one that required a timed entry.  The Visitor Center did not seem very busy, either because nobody had signed up for such an early entry time or because of the rain, which was not really that heavy and eventually dwindled to nothing by mid-morning.

We climbed up Arches Scenic Drive into the Park and were immediately surrounded by tall cliffs and mesas, just a spectacular drive, even with the top up and the windshield wipers going.

I had learned at the Visitor Center that the Park contained some 2000 arches.  New arches are being formed continually in the sandstone rock, but they have a timespan and all of the rock arches, even the thick ones, will collapse in time.  We stopped at several of the arches along the Scenic Drive, and I was struck by their unusual, descriptive names:  The Three Gossips, Tower of Babel, The Organ, Parade of Elephants, Garden of Eden, Delicate Arch, Dark Angel, and Private Arch.

 

 

We walked up to the North Window Arch on a short but steep assent and posed for a photo.

 

Farther along the Scenic Drive we hiked back to Sand Dune Arch, which took us through a very narrow canyon.  An incredible place.

 

A little farther along we came to Balanced Rock.

 

When we had returned on the Scenic Drive, we drove just a short distance down the Highway 191 to the entrance to Canyonlands National Park, another Park not on our original itinerary.  We climbed to the picturesquely-named Island in the Sky Visitor Center where there were broad views looking out onto sagebrush-covered valleys, but to be honest we had been so thrilled by the arches that we had just seen that we were a little disappointed.   

We walked out to an overlook and I was able to examine up close what I had been seeing along the road, two-needle Pinyon, Pinus edulis.  The wood has been used for centuries for heat and cooking, and the seeds – pine nuts – are rich in calories, protein and fat, although they are abundant only periodically - every sixth year.

We continued on to our next stop, Mesa Verde National Park, where we would be staying in Kayenta, Arizona, on the Navajo Reservation.  On the way we encountered more arches, including Wilson’s Arch.

 

We also passed a place named simply Hole in the Rock, a commercialized tourist trap which promised an up-close view of yet another arch (we did not stop), reminding me once again why National Parks are one of our country’s best ideas.  If they had not been established, every arch we had seen this morning would have been as sensationally advertised.

 

We arrived at Hampton Inn in Kayenta, home of a Native American restaurant called Reuben Heflin.  There were some interesting dishes on the menu, including a Navajo specialty, light and delicate fry bread.  There was no beer or wine with dinner, though, as alcohol is not permitted on the reservation.

 

It had been a long day.  We had been trying to keep up with the various time zones we had been traveling through on the trip (it was helpful to know when businesses and parks opened and closed).  I had kept my watch on Eastern Time but had been changing the clock in the Mini to reflect local time, but in Kayenta I gave up the effort.  We were in the Mountain Time Zone, but Arizona obstinately refuses to recognize Daylight Savings Time.  The Navajo Nation, however, does recognize it.  I concluded that it was Dark Thirty and time for bed.