Hurricane to Moab, UT

Yesterday, we moved from Hurricane to Moab, UT. The trip took longer than we usually like to travel but the scenery, all the way, was marvelous. The parts of southern Utah we have seen may be the most beautiful of any large area we have been in. Just over every hill, just around every curve, we have been amazed and sometimes stunned at how different and beautiful it is. From high desert, to rugged rock formations, to snowcapped mountains, to rolling hills, to salt seeping up onto the surface - well, you get the picture. Poor Carol's "trigger finger" is too pooped to pop after taking all of the photos she did during this trip. We are now camped in Moab between a snowcapped range and a red rock range with steep cliffs. We see the red range out our picture window and the snowcaps out our side windows. I would have published this blog entry last night but, soon after getting set up and checking messages, we discovered that our friend, Glenn Adams, had succumbed to cancer at noon yesterday in Florida. He was a friend that we met in the Montana Owners Club and we had talked to monthly on the cell, until he no longer was able to communicate. We will miss him so much! The photos uploaded into the computer differently and I had to pick these from tiny pics so I hope that the right ones are here.

Zion National Park

WOW!!! Every time we visit an attraction, such as a national park, we leave and say "That was the most beautiful yet," or some such remark. That surely is true after visiting Zion National Park in Southern Utah, today. I am spent, just from all the oohing and aahing that we did today. Unforgettable! We took the drive through the rocky canyon and found it to all that we heard it was and more! The drive through is only 12 miles but it took us several hours and over 300 photographs to traverse. Couldn't stop enough to get a better look and started rationing how many of the sights to photograph because, once again, we forgot the power cord to recharge the camera batteries. We started from our RV park, of course, and the view of the snowcapped mountain and the red bluff between us and the mountain were what greeted us from still inside the park. From there, it just continued getting better with each sight vying for attention over the one just prior. The vast cliffs and chasms, some with snow on them, once again took all of our descriptors away from us. There was a narrow, twisty, turny tunnel through one of the mountains that was build in 1930 so you know how narrow it is. What a trip! Gotta revitalize today and then tomorrow is a long, for us, travel day to Moab, UT, where we will see Arches National Park. They are talking about a storm coming in from the Pacific that should give us rain and winds mid-week. Hopefully, the winds will not hinder our travel through the Colorado mountains. I do not tow in high winds or snow. Oh, yes. Tell me if the last photo is The Titanic striking an ice flow?

Las Vegas to Hurricane, UT

We left Sin City this morning and now are in Hurricane, NV. When we left Vegas we remarked, as we have daily, how blessed the residents of this area are to be able to see the beautiful mountains all around them, some snowcapped. On the northeast portion of Vegas, we drove through a portion of Nellis Air Force Base and were fortunate enough to see several jet fighters doing their thing over the desert. What a thrilling sight that was. The mountain views along this route were, once again, spectacular. Today we saw a lot of red rocks, Carol's favorite color of rocks to see on the mountains. Before we entered Utah on I-15, we drove through a portion of Northwest Arizona and the formations were almost beyond belief. There was a section of the Interstate that had steep up and down grades and the amount of rock that had to be blasted to make this highway was breathtaking. Our road following the twisting, turning Virgin River. In some places it was dry and in some it was flowing rapidly and muddy. Carol took over 200 photos during this trip and, since I was driving through these rugged mountains and could not see the sights, I was able to see what I missed tonight on the computer. Some of them almost look 3D! Dontcha just love digital cameras? When we got set up in the campground, we discovered a great perk, we have a view of a snowcapped mountain out our picture window. Tonight we went into Hurricane to grab a bite and hurt Sunshine's feelings, big time. We thought we had found a park where we would eat our sandwiches and it looked, to her, like a dog park. The fence did not go all around the park and people had their dogs out running and she just knew we were going to a dog park. Because there was not a complete fence, we had to leave and she whined for a while, before becoming too tired to care. We really have spoiled her with the dog parks in several cities we have been in and look forward to the next one almost as much as she does. She goes crazy when she sees dogs on the other side of chain link fences. We closed out our pictoral today with the sun setting into the mountains. Tomorrow we go to Zion National Park.

A great day in Vegas!

Today was a great day! Sunshine slept most of the day after running herself ragged yesterday at the dog park, Carol and I did very little and we all went back to the dog park this afternoon. Tired as she was, Sunshine really got excited when she saw we were pulling into the parking lot for the dog park. She was so much so that we thought she might go through the window to get there. She ran and played for a half hour with her friends and then came over to us with her tongue hanging out a yard and asked to be taken home. We came home and, after she had supper, she went right back to sleep. Only gets up to get a drink and then back to sleep. Bliss! Tomorrow we head to Utah. We will spend a few days in Hurricane, UT and then a few in Moab. In Moab, we will meet up with Robbie and Alice, who are hosting at Arches National Park. They are from the Montana Owners Club. From there, on through Colorado and then up to Casper, WY to see my son. This Southwest "Recon Trip" has been tiring but we now have a tentative plan in place for next year - where we want to go and what we want to do when we get there. This is a great lifestyle and we are so very fortunate to be able to live it. We also look forward to getting back to Michigan and seeing our family. We have been missing them, only chatting on Facebook and talking on the cell and/or Skype with them.

Hoover Dam

Yesterday, we drove to Hoover Dam, only about a half hour away. Beautiful drive there and back. We passed Lake Meade and it is fabulous. They are building a new road and bridge to pass over Hoover Dam so that should assist with traffic in the future. There are many ways to see this marvelous creation. One can take an elevator down into the dam or just drive across the top. We drove across the top and stopped for a while at the visitors center. Before we started this journey, we adopted Sunshine and knew that we would have to "go touristing" differently and this was one of those times. Pets are not welcome in many areas so we see what we can and sometimes one will go into an attraction and photograph it and the other will find something to do with Sunshine. We have not felt shorted by the way we have "touristed" on this trip and next year things will probably be different.