Magnus Goes to the Red Rock Country, Day 10

Thursday, September 19

We had a wild and crazy drive from Ruby's to the Offroad RV Resort. It was only about 120 miles, and I had evaluated the routes and decided on taking U.S. 89 to Utah 24. But google had that listed as a whole lot longer, so we started north on google's fastest route--which immediately became a mess with free-range cattle, no shoulders, and a hint of a dirt road ahead. We rapidly found a turnaround spot and went back to SH 12.

Starting out

 Going up

All that wasted about 10 minutes. SH 12 was a good road, with an indication of shoulders, but the route it chose turned out to be a hoot.  It went around a bunch of rock formations, the red kind that are so cool to observe.  Then it went way up in the mountains, passing a pine forest and then a taller pine forest and then aspens and almost a tree line. We topped off at a pass at "summit 9700 feet", which I assume means that we were at the summit, otherwise why tell us?

Then down a bunch of 8%, 10% and even one 12% grade (only a mile for that one) to end up in the incredibly gorgeous Capital Reef National Park. We'll go back there tomorrow. And then we found ourselves in a whitish, grayish wasteland of boulders and gravel slides and dry desert washes. Not all that pretty, but scenic.

 Rest stop

That went on for a while, but we'd picked up the Fremont River by then and the road was following its course. Roads that follow rivers go the way of rivers--left then right then left then right then...nausea.  Eventually the Fremont disappeared and I despaired--Offroad RV Resort was supposed to be on the Fremont river. 

 

But soon the road went through some farmland and rediscovered the river. And there we were--Offroad RV Resort.

 Huge bluff and rock formations to the south, west and north.  A river running right alongside the campground, and lots of new tree plantings that they're keeping watered. If the water holds up, the place will be awesomely gorgeous in 20 years or so.  But for now it's awfully pretty.

The very nice owners changed us from the back-in spot I'd chosen alongside the river to a pull-through site a little ways over. They were being nice and I appreciated it, but the other place had every chance of seeing wildlife while drinking our morning coffee and the new one didn't. No biggeee--it makes Ed happier and it certainly does make it easier to hook up and leave on our last day.

The resort had two trails, one a little quarter mile loop through "the forbidden forest" and the other a one-mile loop to the river.  They said it was a mile, anyway--I'd have said a half mile or three-quarters.  I was wearing my hiking sandals, so I decided to step off the flat, hardened mud at the upper riverbank down onto the flat, hardened mud closer to the water. Which was wet, flowing mud.

Sorry to say, the second layer of mud was not hardened at all. My foot sunk down above my sandal and brought a considerable chunk of the goo back up with it. Yucky!  if I'd put both feet down I'd probably still be stuck to this day.

In the evening I sat out to watch the sun go down, and soon was watching a lovely parade of little bats. So sweet!