Moab and Arches National Park

Our first morning in Moab we headed straight out to Arches National Park to get in a hike before it was too warm. 

These shots are from the Park Avenue trail.

After school we headed to the balanced rock section of the park. 

In this section I sort of expected the roadrunner or Wiley Coyote to run by. Beep beep!

We just went to the viewpoint for Delicate Arch, and not the full hike. Even though we have a relaxed schedule on this trip, we still have to make a lot of decisions about what we can and can't do or see. Often this means that we'll do the quickest peek at the most popular site, then spend more time on the longer trails deeper in the park. Taking the shorter viewpoint trail left us time to see the Wolf Ranch and petroglyphs, and pause a while to admire a cute little lizard.

In the mud under the bridge was a lazy toad. It would jump and flop into the mud at some seriously long intervals, which gave the kids a few giggles.

We ended the day at Fiery Furnace. You need a ranger-led tour to go down into it, as apparently you can get yourself quite lost if left to your own devices. So, if you are headed here sign up for the tour at least a month in advance--people coming back up were raving about it. Luckily the ranger gave us a good tip for the hike that we'd take the next day, so we didn't need to wallow in hike envy (much).

Our last day there we set out for the Devil's Garden area. Sounds promising, right? It's really busy for the first mile, as you can see the Navajo and Partition arches from the lower trails. Then, you come to this freaky rock climb. If the ranger hadn't recommended this I'm not sure we would have known this was the trail, or been brave enough to tackle it.

Not only was I stopping to take pictures of the crazy climb, but also perhaps to give myself little pep talks to keep going.

It wasn't really all that scary once we got going, and the kids LOVED climbing up the slick rock.

It was super warm, but there were lots of shady places to rest.

After checking out Navajo Arch we made our way to the Partition Arch. The views from here were amazing.

Lots of rocks to climb, and situations to get yourself into!

After we came back down from this trail (I could say I hiked down, but I scooted down that last steep part of the trail on my bum), we split up near the crowded trail head while three of us had a snack and two went to go check out another arch. It was a crowded fork in the road, and we were standing next to a cute older couple. A tour bus group proceeded to plow through us, with maps out and backpacks and elbows flying. They may have asked the older gentleman which trail to take, or he may have just offered it up in a faux accent that the trail they wanted was "A hundred miles that-a-way, into zee desert." To which his wife put her hand over her face and walked away, and he replied after her, "What? I was just trying to be helpful!" She didn't find it amusing, but it made us laugh.

I also needed that dose of humor to get me through grocery shopping in Moab later. I wouldn't think it was possible to have a personal crisis in the produce aisle, wondering if I should just suck it up and pay the $5/lb for fruit that doesn't look that great or seem to have a high turnover. Then wandering pathetically around trying to find anything that looks edible and reasonably priced. Normally I also look for local and organic, but hitting all four points outside of the Pacific Northwest seems to be as likely as being struck by lightening in a snowstorm. 

Produce angst aside, this is how we felt about our last day in Arches!