34. Sept. 14--Montrose, Colorado?

MADE IT TO COLORADO! Yahoo, as they say around these parts!!

We left Moab, Utah early (partially due to a bus just below our window cranking up at 06:15), had breakfast (a muffin and coffee) at the "Love Muffin". Gotta love the name.

Headed into Arches National Park very early (before the busses got there) and got prime views of morning sun hitting some of the more than 2,500 arches of sandstone in the park. We saw eight of them that were on the road through the park.

We have used superlatives throughout this blog to describe the sights we have seen. Arches NP goes beyond anything previously described. The sheer size and height of the cliffs, the multitude of colors (primarily red with streaks of black), the tortuous shapes carved into the cliff sides through millenia, the scope of the park left us both thinking that Arches is the best of the sights we have seen. Sequoia,  leaving Zion on your own tour, and the California coastline are all tied for second. Magnificent!!

All over the park were stands of rock like this

Just standing there in the middle of 'nowhere'

Double arch

'Delicate Arch'

Passage leading to "Sand Arch', hidden off the mainstream. 

After we left Arches, we looped around the eastern side of the park and headed to a big road, rt. 70, into Grand Junction, Colorado. We stopped at a visitors center and got way more information than we wanted about geting to Salida, a town we were in once before.

We drove south along route 128 and the Colorado river. A maginficent drive again. the sides of the cliffs were right down to the road on one side with the river on the other side. Sheer cliffs, hundreds of feet high were wonderful to see.  Lots of rafters were out on the river, floating on the high water of the recent rains.

Canyon of the Colorado

Very muddy Colorado river head waters

As the day was getting long, we pulled into a Hampton hotel in Montrose, CO. Small town, not too much to offer the tourist, but a great brewery.

Tomorrow, we head for Salida and then Denver to Norma's house (Lee's dad's wife) and chill out until Lee's brother Jonathan's wedding on Sunday, Sept. 21. There may not be blog activity for awhile as Norma probably does not have WiFi (unless Lee can talk her into it.)

Stay tuned, boys and girls! More will be revealed.