Back In Time

*Critters we’ve seen on our 2010 trip so far: javelina, mule deer, desert grassland whiptail lizard, white-tailed antelope squirrels, jackrabbit, juvenile Chuckwalla, Great Basin collared lizard, bats, llamas, Utah prairie dogs, chipmunks, coyote, yellow-bellied marmot
*Birds we’ve seen on our 2010 trip so far: white-wing dove, ravens, Gamble’s quail, western tanager, roadrunner, violet-green swallow, California condor, great blue heron, mountain bluebird, wild turkey, black-chinned hummingbird, juniper titmouse, magpie
*National Parks/Monuments visited on 2010 trip so far: 18
*State Parks visited on 2010 trip so far: 4
*Total number of Jr. Ranger badges so far: 18

[Click on any picture to enlarge…then arrow back to the blog]

Our next stop added another state to where The Folly has spent the night since Colorado National Monument (www.nps.gov/colm) is located between Fruita and Grand Junction, CO. We arrived through the west entrance (Fruita) on Fri., driving the first 4 miles of Rim Rock Drive to the campground. This drive is 23 miles of switchbacks with an elevation change of approximately 1,100 feet, and the view at left is from close to the top looking back down the road. There are two tunnels on this section of the drive with a center height of 16’ but 11’5” near the edges. Our RV’s height is just under 13’ so to be safe we basically needed to drive down the center of the tunnels, which was a little unnerving a times!

There are no hookups at Saddlehorn Campground, and while pinyon and juniper trees are abundant throughout, they are small and offer little shade. We were just hoping the house batteries would continue to work properly with the hot weather. Even after 3 years, there’s still a lot we really don’t know about the inner workings of drycamping. Though generators could run from 8am-8pm, we didn’t want to run it the whole time for two reasons: 1) the constant noise would probably disturb other campers 2) it would use a lot of our diesel. So we tried to be sparing with its use saving it for the hottest parts of the day to run the A/C. These motorhomes heat up pretty quickly inside, and we especially need to be careful because of the animals. In fact Sat. we loaded all 3 into the car and drove about 2/3 of Rim Rock Drive.

Driving among rock layers that are millions of years old, we passed Independence Monument, all that remains of a continuous ridge that once formed a wall between two canyons. We also passed Balanced Rock, Artists Point, Fallen Rock, Coke Ovens, and reached the highest point on Rim Rock Drive at 6,640 ft. before turning around. Since the animals were with us, we weren’t able to hike any of the trails but did get out taking advantage of some incredible views from the many overlooks. Of course after a month in Utah seeing quite a number of impressive canyons, they were all beginning to look alike and this one wasn’t as impressive as others we’d seen. Had we seen it first, we probably would have been more awe struck. Don’t get us wrong, though, it’s still an incredible place to see. Just realizing the billions of years that it has taken to sculpt and create this masterpiece is mind boggling. Plus we did earn another Junior Ranger badge.

After two nights, we decided to head a little further north and hopefully maybe to cooler weather. We drove the scenic route along Hwy. 139 that took us to a height of 8,268 ft. at Douglas Pass. Our destination was Dinosaur National Monument (www.nps.gov/dino), which stretches across the state line between CO and UT, and is home to the world's largest Jurassic period dinosaur quarry. However, we weren’t able to see the wall that displays the nearly 1,500 fossils since it is only viewable through a glass wall at the visitor center that was being rebuilt, but you can take a virtual tour of it on their website.

We arrived at the temporary visitor center on the UT side of the Monument, and when we walked in to get the lay of the land before heading to the campground, one of the volunteers noticed our Jr. Ranger badges. She told us that not only could we become Jr. Rangers of Dinosaur NM, but we could also earn a Junior Paleontologist badge and gave us the both workbooks! This temporary visitor center has many fossils and exhibits on display plus offers a shuttle to the Fossils Discovery Trail to see unexcavated fossils still embedded in the rock, which we decided we’d do the next day.

The campground was located along the Green River, a main tributary of the Colorado River, and though we weren’t able to see it from our campsite because of all the trees and brush, it was only a short walk away. The temperatures weren’t much cooler and we still had no hookups, but at least we had a nice shade tree (and still able to get satellite reception).

A night sky ranger program was being offered the first night led by Niles Allen. He and his wife, Bonnie, are volunteers who travel to various national parks assisting with the night sky programs. His was the best star program we’ve attended so far as he is quite knowledgeable, enthusiastic, and eager to share the night sky with his audience. Four telescopes were set up, and we saw not only Saturn and the moon but also Venus, the Hercules Star Cluster (145 light years across, containing hundreds of thousands of stars), Wild Duck Star Cluster (containing about 2,900 stars), a ghost star (the remains of a star that died millions of light years ago), and Mizar (a double star located in the handle of the Big Dipper).

The next morning we drove to the visitor center to catch the shuttle to the fossil site. Generally it’s a ½ mile self-guided hike, but we were fortunate to be on the shuttle with the ranger going up for shift change. The 7 of us got a personalized tour along the way, which was good since we probably would have passed right by bone fossils without realizing it. Most simply look like the rest of the rock, but a couple have a white arrow pointing them out like in the picture at left. At right is a vertebrae, and in the picture below left, Russ is pointing to part of a leg bone…can you imagine the size of this thing!?! By the way, did you know that the Brontosaurus is now called the Apatosaurus? Back in the 1800s fossils of the Apatosaurus had already been discovered and named when someone discovered a skeleton that he believed to be of an entirely different genus and named it Brontosaurus. In the 1990s the name correction began to take place, but we just found out.

Tues. morning I took a drive to the Josie Bassett Morris homesite. This fascinating, independent woman lived most of her 90 years in the area, living the last 50 years in a cabin that she built with the help of one of her grandsons. She farmed the land, raised cattle, pigs, and chickens, and enjoyed entertaining guests. She married 5 times and divorced 4, brewed apricot brandy and chokecherry wine during the Prohibition, and though she died in 1964, she lived here without running water, electricity, or a telephone. I included the picture at left because if you enlarge it, the placard shows pictures of her in and around her home. The wallpaper you see has been removed (or rotted away) and only bare logs are visible inside the cabin, but here and there I found small scraps of the floral wallpaper and the newspaper she used for insulation still attached to the wall. I decided to take the 1-1/2 mile roundtrip Hog Canyon hiking trail that took me to one of the box canyons Josie used as a natural corral for her livestock. As I walked along, I tried to imagine living the hard life she led…what a remarkable woman.

The next day we headed for WY via Hwy. 191 reaching a summit of 8,446 ft., making a couple of stops along the way. The first was in Ashley National Forest at the Aspen Grove Interpretive Trail. We had pulled off into this parking lot mainly to stretch our legs, but when we discovered the trail, we decided to take the dogs for a walk (we even let them off the leash!) The trail was relatively short, meandering among the trees and flowering plants, and ended at a lovely green meadow with a small lake amid the pines.

Back in the RV, our next stop was Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area (http://www.utah.com/nationalsites/flaming_gorge.htm), and we stopped at the Red Canyon Visitor Center where we found this gorgeous sight outside the full length plate glass windows. The visitor center is located at the cliff’s edge over 1,000 feet above the Flaming Gorge Reservoir that was formed by the Flaming Gorge Dam on the Green River. The area is famous for boating, fishing, and its trophy lake trout.

Hwy. 191 crosses over the dam, so after leaving the visitor center, that’s where we headed. We had read that free tours of the dam were available, so we parked in the lot, started up the generator to run the A/C for the animals, and went inside. The tour lasted about an hour starting at the top of the dam 500 ft. above the river, down the elevator 7 floors, through the power plant past the generators, and behind the dam face across to the other side. Here at the dam’s base you have the opportunity to feed the huge trout just below in the river. There’s basically a gumball machine filled with fish pellets, and for 25 cents you get a small handful. However not all the pellets end up in the hand, especially when little kids are buying some. But not to fear, no cleanup staff needed because there is a large yellow-bellied marmot that takes care of it! A marmot generally looks like a very large squirrel that can weigh 5 – 11 lbs., and this one looked like it was tipping the scale at the high end. It was funny to watch her as she would wait until everyone had left the fenced in area, and then sneak in to devour all the pellets that had dropped on the ground. She obviously knows the schedule and comes out of her hiding place a few minutes before the tour group is ready to head back every hour. Oh, and we’re sure the fish know the schedule, too!

After the tour it was on to our destination for the night…the Wal-Mart in Rock Springs, WY. There are usually a couple other RVs that overnight in the lots when we do, but this one looked like a campground! There had to be about 25 RVs, trailers, and campers of all varieties. Initially we were thinking that the campground down the road was probably upset because they’d be losing business, but when we passed it early the next morning, it was packed, too.