Road Trip Day Three

Heading south from Moab on State Route 191, about half-way to Monticello, Wilson Arch was visible from the road. There were several hikers in the area and I tried to catch one under the arch waving his arms, but I wasn't quite fast enough: (Click the picture to see the guy.)
At Blanding, we turned off onto Route 95. This is another "Scenic Byway" and it billed itself as the Bicentenial Highway. (By the way, we also discovered that they have "Scenic Backways" that are another whole level of primitiveness.) There was not a lot of traffic... this guy on a bicycle is getting ready to cruise down a 10% grade at about 35 MPH:
Along the way, an interesting sight was Jacob's Chair sitting all alone on a mesa:
The road followed White Canyon for quite a while. It was pretty impressive, but we didn't get a good picture of it. Unless you are right on top of it, not much of it shows (as in the photo above). We finally crossed over it when it took a turn to connect into Glen Canyon and Lake Powell, but there was no place to stop on the road. Shortly after, we met up with the Colorado River again when Route 95 crossed over it on this bridge:
There were several recreational areas where you could approach the river, but most of the turn-offs didn't even look like roads, so even though you could see pit stops down there, you couldn't figure out how to get to them. This part of the river is probably the nothern-most limit of what you could call Lake Powell. (A "Uranium Rush" town called Hite is mostly under water here, having been flooded when Lake Powell was created.)
The nicest rest area was at a spot called Hog Spring. It had nice trees, a suspension footbridge over the spring, and shaded picnic tables placed up into the canyon.
After crossing through the San Rafael Desert, the landscape changed again as we reached Capitol Reef National Park, with water, trees, and strange black lava boulders that looked like gigantic rabbit droppings. One of the attractions in the park is a set of petroglyphs pecked into the cliff wall:
When we went to leave, the truck would not start, or even turn over, the temperature guage was pegged at the high end, and it seemed like the block had seized up. We waited and prayed for a while, and then tried again. Still nothing. After a lot of effort, we got the stuck hood open, and that attracted some helpers. We jump started it from another vehicle and went on our way. We are stopping in Torrey tonight (just outside of the park) and will check it out further in the morning.

Also... no good cell phone coverage here in Torrey, just "digital roam".

Colorado River Scenic Byway

We took a little side trip up Route 128 along the Colorado River.

We had been told that there was a scenic byway that makes a La Sal Mountain loop, starting with a turn at Castle Valley.
We climbed about 3,000 feet from the Colorado River and the road kept getting narrower and narrower.
When we reached 6,946 feet up, we decided that it was going to keep going up, and with the truck overheating, it was time to head back down.

Road Trip Day Two

Gigantic signs posted along the park road:
(Two out of three are gigantic, anyway.)

It was eerily quiet in the park, but there was this one bird flying around:

These are the Three Gossips:

The photo doesn't really show how massive they are, until you see them in a wide-angle view. Note the tiny car on the road in the foreground:

This is Balanced Rock, with a gigantic hand waiting to stop it when it falls:

View of La Sal Mountain Range in the distance:

I spotted a few flowers here and there along the road, but, except for these, they were all in spots where you could not pull over. Probably means that the accessible ones don't last very long.

Road Trip Day 1

Taking US 6 southeast from Provo Utah. Photos of some of the terrain approaching Price Utah, and the good old pickup truck that we borrowed with 228k miles on it:

It is amazing how fast everything completely changes, here are radical changes in the landscape just after Price:

We took a few minutes in Arches National Park after dinner in Moab (at the Broken Oar Restaurant):

Not Very Tasty

I looked out the back door yesterday morning and saw a squirrel sitting on the back yard fence, eating a bright red carrot. He worked on it for quite a while, long enough to get the camera.


I wouldn't think that anything out of the garden would be very tasty this early in the season, especially if it is made of plastic.

Candlelight Vigil Caught on Camera

The Evidence Remains Inconclusive

Momma gave me a stud finder as one of my Christmas presents. Since the disappearance of Troll may have been the result of a construction accident or maybe even foul play, we decided to check out the fresh concrete in the basement.


Although on the surface this doesn't seem to be a very good application for a stud finder, Rumples appears to be pretty convinced.

Troll Was Last Seen "Helping" In The Basement

Review of basement video shows the last sighting of Troll:

He was right there in the middle of things, then, when we looked back the next minute, he was gone. Why would he just disappear like that?

It May Be The End of Troll

Missing! Have you seen this troll? 173 years old. Bright pink hair. Last seen wearing a shiny red fireman's coat.

Quite a Drain

Most of the drain pipe is now in place. It is much bigger around than the old drain tiles. Here in the crazy plumbing area, the drain pipe gets crazy to go under it:

Troll seems to really be fascinated by the clean-outs in the pipe:

Notice how the perforated pipe is wearing stockings to keep the gravel out of the inside... I would not have thought to look for something like that in Lowes if I were doing the work.

Basement Reinforcements

Frank's finally got a building permit on Wednesday morning and started chewing up the basement floor. The puddles are where the posts are going:


Some of the strange plumbing in the basement has gotten stranger:





Since opening up the floor for the posts cut into the old drain tile that fed the sump pump, we added a couple of $ grand to waterproof the perimeter. A foot-wide opening is being made on all four walls (even the ones that don't get posts), and this will be lined with gravel and a perforated drain pipe:



One of the last changes that the engineer made was to specify 4 x 4 beams spaced at three foot intervals (instead of 4 x 6 at four foot intervals). This is what the north wall looks like:

The New Dining Room and Kitchen

Drew laid a new floor for us in the dining room and kitchen in October. I'm sure everyone has been waiting to see it, but it has been a busy few weeks since then.



Mom's mail-order rug really looks nice, too.


Mom found some rooster rugs for the kitchen. I'm still working on trim.

We kind of forgot to take "before" pictures. Here are a couple taken during the project.

Just in case you've forgotten what the walls looked like before Drew, Amy, Kay, and Pam painted over them, here they are.

Evan really loved the flowers on the old floor. Not to worry, they are still there, you just can't see them any more.

Dry Creek in the Back Yard

Here is it with rocks. It still needs plants and flowers, but that will probably wait for now.