Part 4 - final, Mid-October – Late-October; Canyonlands NP – White Rim Road; Pagosa Springs, CO

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Along I-70

Leaving Great Basin, we join back up with US-50.  We drive for miles, occasionally seeing vehicles traveling in the opposite direction.  The valleys widen as we continue east.  We come across a dried lakebed turned white, salt.  Driving through a few towns we finally join up with I-70.  As normal practice we stay away from Interstates, but this portion of I-70 is very picturesque.  We see geology at work.  Multicolored sandstone, some with horizontal layers, while others lean, pointing to the sky.  We see areas that resemble the Badlands of South Dakota, with hills and mesas. Be sure to stop at each of the rest areas/overlooks to take in the landscape.

Canyonlands National Park

We arrive at the RV Park in Moab, worn out from our 320-mile day.  We set up, have dinner then walk a block a local grocery store restocking the camper for our three-day trip on the White Rim Road, (WRR).  The next day after breakfast, we do laundry and empty the gray water tank.  Then we head to Canyonlands – Island in the Sky section, to see the upper level of the park, the top of the mesa.  On our last visit, in 2020, we looked down from Island in the Sky, seeing a narrow white trail, the WRR, winding around Island in the Sky.  The road is about 1,000’ below us.  Follow the link: northxsouthwest.blogspot.com/2020/11/more-utah-travels to read about that trip.

White Rim Road from
Island in the Sky

Since that visit, we have been planning to drive that road, and tomorrow we will, at least part of it.  But today, our hopes to see the park are dashed by a long line of tourists.  We decide to turn around when the truck crawls up to the sign ‘From this point you are 60-minutes from the park entrance’.  We will return tomorrow on our trip.  On our way out we stop to do short walks at a few of the overlooks on the road to Canyonlands.

Biking Canyonlands

We make a few photo stops along the road on the way back to town.  Back in town, we find a great Vietnamese fusion restaurant.  We have a noodle salad, a spicey rice bowl and nacho plate with pulled pork and kimchee and other veggies.  Stopping at the Moab visitor center we pick up a number of gifts for others, and geology books for us.  We end our day getting gas and filling our water tank, there is no water available on the WRR.  Back at the RV Park I remove the front jacks from the camper so I don’t have to worry about them hitting any large rocks along the WRR.

Colorado River outside Moab

White Rim Road adventure

We wake before our 445 alarm.  We don’t want to be sitting in line waiting to get into the park today.  We eat, make final preparations and are on the road by 700.  Our plan works, no traffic all the way to the visitor center.  Speaking with the backcountry ranger we are assured the roads are rough, but passable, even with our camper.  Walking out of the visitor center we spot a rainbow, a good sign.  The sky is cloudy for most of the day, nice conditions given the promise of 80° temperatures.  At the Shafer Road turnoff we stop to air-down the tires, making the ride a bit smoother and expanding the footprint of the tires for whatever deep sand we may come across.  Our trip officially starts at 820.

Shafer Road switchbacks.

Video by Nicida

Top looking down

Washboard road greets us as we cross the open mesa.  Rocks and potholes soon appear as we approach the switchbacks taking us from the mesa top to the bottom of the mesa, 1,000’ below.  Suddenly the left side of the mesa disappears revealing canyons below and mesas off in the distance.

One of the few vehicles

we see today

  I have to stop the truck to take in this scene.  I don’t want to drive and look at the same time.  The consequences of missing a turn are too great.  

Bottom looking up

We continue on; the views become more breathtaking, and the road narrows.  We see our road continuing below us, it’s exciting but we are uneasy at the same time.  I am too busy driving to be nervous, making sure I see road between us and the sheer drop-off ending a few hundred feet below us.  I can see, and hear Nicida tensing up, white knuckles and short, sharp breaths.  She concentrates on making videos of our descent, which helps relieve some of her tension.  As we approach the bottom, anxiety subsides. 

Further down the road

Video by Nicida

After 45 minutes of weaving down the switchbacks we arrive at the bottom.  Driving another mile, we are officially on the White Rim Road.  The park brochure informs us that this portion of our journey takes only 30 minutes.  I can see that we will not make it to our planned destination, 25 miles from here, in three hours.

Potash Road from
Gooseneck Overlook

Our first stop is the Gooseneck Overlook. A series of cairns leads us to a high overlook of the Colorado River making a 180° turn on its way to meet up with the Green River, then many more miles into and through the Grand Canyon.

Colorado River

Colorado River from the

Gooseneck Overlook

The road is rough, rougher than the YouTube videos that we studied to determine if we should make this trip, or not.  I take on this challenge, constantly weaving back and forth dodging potholes and/or rocks waiting to scrape the bottom of the truck, or worse, puncture a tire.  The cloudy conditions are a disadvantage when driving this type of road.  The flat lighting makes it hard to distinguish where potholes, rocks and smooth spots are.  Sun and shadows are your friend when driving under these conditions.

A 'rough' spot

Each time we stop for the spectacular views, or photos, or to eat, or a bathroom break; we open the camper, curious to learn what size tornado passed through.  Each time, we find many items that started out secured in a spot, other than the floor, resting on the floor.  I am happy to report our refrigerator door, bound by duct tape, does not open throughout our WRR adventure.  Our going is slow, we seldom break 5 mph through the rough sections of the drive.

Rounding each arm from the mesa above, the scenery dramatically changes.  The valleys below, also change, our heads are on swivels to take in all the scenery.  After 3+ hours from the start of our excursion we come to Airport Campsite, 18 miles into today’s trip of the planned 30 miles.  Our plan is to stay here tomorrow night, on our way back out.  We have seen less than 10 vehicles on the road since we started.  Most of the traffic is organized groups of bicyclists, with support vehicles, doing the entire 100-mile route over a few days. 

Musselman Arch

An overland 4WD vehicle passes us, a small pickup with large knobby tires.  It is raised for extra ground clearance; it has banks of LED lights to turn night into day.  Its bed is filled with camping gear for these conditions.  It seems to glide over the rugged road we lumber across.  They quickly disappear from view as the road bends around another mesa.  A mile or so up the road, on the other side of a switchback, we see the driver and navigator studying the road, planning the best way to negotiate the rock wall leaning over the road on one side and a several foot drop-off on the other.  We stop to observe...  We see stones from the road roll down the embankment as the truck inches its way up the road.  Finally, the road widens, and the driver stops, success.  I call across the switchback “Does it look like we can get through?”  He offers to guide us through, Nicida and I confer.  We are wider and much taller, than they are.  They will not be here to guide us back through.  We look again…

We decide to pass on going any further.  We thank them for their offer but do not feel that the road is wide enough for us to pass safely.  Turning around we see another overland vehicle, matching the first, head on to the narrow shelf road.  While I would like to continue, I do not feel we would have made it through unscathed.

We are only a couple miles past the Airport Campsite, our new place to stay for the night.  We have been bouncing, weaving, and crawling along the WRR for five hours when we arrive.  We are beat; from the road, from being tense, from the continual concentration needed to get here safely and in one piece.  Even with all these challenges we are glad we made this trip.

Washer Woman Arch
seen from Mesa Arch

We meet the family we saw earlier on our drive and ask them if we can share their campsite for the night.  They agree and tell us of their plans for the WRR.  We inform them of the narrow passage they will be facing tomorrow, but they are smaller than us so we feel they should not have any trouble making it through the shelf road.  This location provides a backside view of the 500’ tall sandstone ‘Washer Woman Arch’.  The common view of the Washer Woman Arch is from Mesa Arch in the Island in the Sky District of Canyonlands.

View of Mesa and
Washer Woman Arches

We are astonished we can identify the Washer Woman from this location.  ‘She’ a narrow ‘fin’ of sandstone rather than a thick monolith, making it recognizable from front and back.

After dinner we walk out to the edge of the mesa looking down into the valley.  We cannot walk directly to the edge.  Instead, we have to walk on the bare rock or in the small channels where runoff from recent rainstorms keeps the sand clean of vegetation.  We stay away from the Cryptobiotic soil, a fragile layer of soil forming in arid and semi-arid parts of the world.  It develops over years, if not decades, helping to bind the soil, protecting it from erosion.  When it first forms it resembles regular dirt.  Older, mature Cryptobiotic soil becomes thick and bumpy, either brown or black.  A single step can destroy dozens of years of Cryptobiotic soil development.  Weaving our way back to the camper we call it a day, heading to bed, exhausted.  Tomorrow we will decide if we stay here for the day or head back to Moab for the night.

Washer Woman Arch
from WRR

We are up at 630 to catch sunrise on the WRR.  We head back towards the Washer Woman Arch for sunrise images.  All around us are spots for great images, all dependent on the sun.  The sky is clear this morning, so we have to watch to see the different formations light-up with the first rays of sun.  I remember the instructions from Don and Gary on our New Zealand workshop – ‘watch to see where the sun is shining.’ 

We watch and shoot, side-lit mesas, arches, backlit mesas, close ups of distant mesas.  By 830 we call it a day.  Time for breakfast, and our drive back to Moab, cutting our time on the WRR short by a day.

The road back

The cloudless sky makes discerning potholes and rocks easier, allowing me to dodge each.  The road is still rough, but I feel it may not be as rough as yesterday. 

Rough road ahead

Video by Nicida

Maybe I’m just getting used to rocking back and forth.  We arrive at Potash Road, another exit from the WRR, allowing us to bypass the Shafer Road switchbacks.  Potash Road is quite scenic in places, but it takes us over two hours to get back to Moab.  It’s just different.

Another view

Video by Nicida

Petroglyphs

Arriving back at the same RV Park we stayed in before our adventure, we go to work cleaning and reassembling the camper.  I reinstall the two camper jacks and reinflate the tires to their normal operating pressure.  Nicida works to remove all the red dust the camper has collected on our 40+ mile drive on the WRR.  Then we shower, have dinner and treat ourselves to ice cream, before heading off to bed.  Tomorrow Pagosa Springs, Colorado.

Return home

San Juan River
near Pagosa Springs

Our day starts at 7, after breakfast we detour to a truck wash to remove red dust/sand from the camper.  Once out of town, our route takes us directly into a strong headwind.  It stays this way until we pass through Durango, CO.  We run through intermittent rain showers on the road to Pagosa Springs.  We finally stop at an RV park just outside of town, along the San Juan River.  As we check into our site we learn that snow is in the forecast in the higher mountains surrounding Pagosa Springs.  But it is nice this late afternoon.  After dinner, we walk along the river catching the last few rays of sunlight hitting the golden trees on the surrounding mountainsides.  We quicken our pace back to the camper, as a few raindrops start falling on us from large threatening clouds.  Back in the camper, we plot out our last few stops before arriving home, we don’t want to be here when the snow arrives.

We face intermittent fog and light rain as we cross from CO into NM.  Stopping at Chama we see a Cumbres and Toltec scenic train setting on the tracks waiting for visitors to board.  We want to ride this train, but not today.  Instead, we hang around waiting for engineer to start the trip – full steam ahead.  The scene is exciting, the cool, damp temperatures seem to make the smoke and steam explode out of the smokestack and whistle.  We watch and shoot many photos of the spectacle.  Train gone, we stop in one of the local jewelry shops visiting and purchasing a few gifts for family at home.  We are not able to pick up the desired elderberry jam, the real reason for our stop.  Maybe next time.

Rio Chama above Abiquiu

Today’s destination is Ojo Caliente Mineral Springs Resort and Spa.  When we lived in Albuquerque, we visited a few times to enjoy the relaxing pools.  We are staying in the campground attached to the Spa, a convenient, short walk between the two.  The day is cool and cloudy, but the water is warm, or hot, depending on the pool.  We spend a couple hours going between the 13 pools on the grounds.  Tired, but relaxed, we retire for the night, preparing for final two-day drive home.

Hordes Creek Lake

The next morning is gray, cloudy and windy.  We even pass through a heavy but brief storm with sleet.  The wind continues to buffet us throughout the day.  Our last night, we stop at Hordes Creek Lake, a US Army Corps of Engineers reservoir, west of Coleman, TX.  The campsites are spacious and shaded with lots of open green space between campgrounds.  It is a very relaxing place.  The lake’s water level is low, like many of the other lakes in TX, but people are out enjoying boating and beach time.  As evening approaches, we see a colorful sunset prompting us to stay out to enjoy the evening.  But… the mosquitoes have another plan.  We retire early, tomorrow we head home.

Eager to get home from our 33-day trip we decide to find breakfast in town.  We didn’t find any open restaurants, but we did find Coleman Donuts and Bakery.  The parking lot is full of cars, a good sign.  Entering the shop, we get in line for donuts.  Business is brisk, shelves of donuts are more empty than full, but there is still a good selection.  Each family in front of us exits the shop with a box of donuts and smiles on their faces.  We spot, then order breakfast burritos, one of our favorite breakfasts in NM.  We also get an apple fritter, full of apples, and the last cinnamon roll.  It has a light sugar coating, not the thick frosting we usually find.  All are delicious.

Arriving home, we empty the camper and start laundry.  As I mentioned at the start of this series of posts, this is our last trip with our Hallmark camper.  We have had a wonderful seven years of adventures with it.  We already have another camper and heavier truck on order, due sometime mid-2025.  New road adventures will begin then.

A few weeks later I was contacted by a couple from OK, interested in buying my Hallmark.  They drove down, we went over the plusses and shortcoming of the camper, and they decided to buy it.  It was bittersweet seeing it go, but we are certain it is going to a good family that will take it on other adventures.

Thank you for stopping by,

Mark