Category: Galleries

Capitol Reef National Park

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Nearing the end of our southern Utah road trip, we swung south and around from the eastern side of Canyonlands National Park, crossing the Colorado River on the northern reach of Glen Canyon to eventually make our way to Capitol Reef National Park.  We had only one day to spend hiking among fantastic towering rock walls on some trails accessible from the main highway before boondocking overnight just outside the park and then having to head home.  I’m sure there’s plenty more to see in Capitol Reef and of course there’s still so much more to explore across all of southern Utah in future trips!

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Canyonlands National Park

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Continuing our road trip through southern Utah, Darlene and I moved on to Canyonlands National Park.  Canyonlands is actually divided into three separate districts which can only be accessed separately.  We spent four days exploring the Islands in the Sky district, repeatedly blown away by the incredible vistas revealed in every direction.  Most of our time was spent hiking various trails on the mesa top but we also spent one day biking down from the mesa on the White Rim Road.  Would be great to come back sometime and fully explore that 100-mile rough dirt road.

We lost a half day here and there arranging to get the van’s badly-wearing tires replaced but I got a taste of some of great mountain biking trails outside the park while we were hanging out in the area.  After getting the new tires installed, we headed south from Moab in the midst of snow flurries to spend a couple of days in the Needles district of Canyonlands National Park, including a long day of hiking and scrambling through the Chesler Park area.

We didn’t try to reach the western, third district of Canyonlands, The Maze.  It’s much more remote and much less accessible.

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Arches National Park

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Following our week of skiing in Colorado, we continued our road trip in the campervan by moving on to southern Utah, starting with several days of hiking among the rock formations and arches throughout Arches National Park.  Darlene was also able to snag a permit for us to spend a day scrambling over and squeezing between rocks in the Fiery Furnace.

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Tahoe Skiing

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The 2024-25 ski season in Tahoe wasn’t great.  Plenty of moisture but that often included rain which would muck up the snow and freeze hard overnight and then it was often really warm, in the 40’s and 50’s through the whole season.  We did hit up Northstar and Sugar Bowl over three days with Geof and Jennifer in early January, and a few days at Palisades and Alpine before and after our ski trip / road trip to Colorado and Utah in March.

We also encountered a bobcat along the road in our neighborhood who was so focused on what was happening down the street that he didn’t care that we stopped alongside of him to gawk and take pictures.

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Halloween Gaming Party

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Steve, Anne, Jennifer, Geof, Nacho, Adriana and Luno joined us in costume for a bit of gaming on Halloween, culminating in another twisted game of deception of Blood on the Clocktower moderated by Luno.  I was fingered immediately as the demon after the first night by my first victim, Nacho, and hardly had a chance to try to talk my way out of being revealed and executed by the slayer (Anne) – but by pure luck I was saved by my minion, the poisoner (Jennifer), who just happened to choose Anne to poison the previous night.  Anne’s slay ability thus failed, helping me appear innocent. For the rest of the game Jennifer and I managed to avoid detection, just barely, and ultimately win the game for evil. Darlene is still upset.  😋

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Backpacking into Desolation Wilderness

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Darlene and I went for a short backpacking trip into the southwest corner of Desolation Wilderness (near Lake Tahoe), camping a couple of nights at Twin Lakes.  We had nice weather except for the heavy and unrelenting winds each night.  We spent our layover day making our way cross-country over and up to a nearby peak.  Darlene chose to take a nice nap at the saddle, while I finished the climb up to the top for some tremendous views.

 

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