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Published: July 27th 2009
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MOAB - ARCHES NATIONAL PARK
July 10th
We headed down road 12, which wasn’t exactly in the national park but we still had the beautiful red rock formations. We passed by Tropic (population 460!) not a very big place and further out into the wilderness. Everything is very remote and we didn’t see many other cars, it does make you (read Tine) a bit apprehensive because she worries about what to do if something happened to the car, as we did not have any cell phone connection here. On our way we passed by a large amount of other national parks such as Capitol Reef National Park, but as there wasn’t time to go there if we were to get to our destination this evening, furthermore, the children would have killed us if we had put yet another national park or two on the program.
We had a stop where road 12 ended. Right in the middle of nowhere there was a gas station with a subway in the shop and next to it a very exclusive café with all sorts of coffee, homemade cakes and breads and chocolate. Strange place to find a thing like that and we
wondered how they managed to make ends meet.
Turned left on road 24 towards Green River and finally towards Moab, where we passed by Arches National Park - but that wasn’t until tomorrow.
Found our motel - just at the main road, went out of the car and was like in Vegas met by a wall of heat. This was the 2nd hottest we had dealt with. Paul and Tine went into the pool which was the only place outside where you could breathe. The children avoided the heat altogether and stayed inside. Had dinner at a very nice Mexican restaurant (how come everything in the states has to be spicy - the heat?) and went back to the hotel pool where we all enjoyed ourselves an hour or so in the water and on the slide. Unfortunately, there were no towels and the receptionists were not exactly helpful about this so we just had to use the ones in the room for both the pool and the shower afterwards. Went to bed praying it wouldn’t be as warm tomorrow.
July 11th
Turned out our prayers hadn’t been heard. Maybe our connection with the weather God isn’t
good enough! In our booking it said ‘breakfast included’, but if they wanted to call what they offered breakfast - well then it was highly overrated. Paul went to the supermarket to get some bread since that wasn’t a part of a Moab breakfast.
Got out there pretty early for us - nine - and drove to the park entrance about 15 minutes away. First we went to see the ‘Balancing Rock’, and ‘Delicate Arch’ (not very big), afterwards we took two short hikes to see Wall Arch (actually it isn't an arch anymore as it collapsed on Aug. 5 2008) and the North and (Paul only) the South Arch, since by now the temperature had risen to about a 110. Had lunch in town which was on our way to Cortez and Mesa Verde did some souvenir shopping and drove on. This was really outback country - we found - and you could see that people did not have a lot of money here. We had an uneventful drive to Cortez where we quickly found our Motel and got ourselves settled in.
The children always need time to settle in and see if the telly works and Paul
and Tine were offered a free drink at Kokos just opposite the Motel ,so we sat there on their terrace and enjoyed life and that could sit outside without having a heat stroke. The restaurant quickly got full with locals which we took as a good sign and we decided to eat there so we didn’t have to drive anywhere. Had a nice dinner and a wonderful sunset over the mountains. After dinner Paul and Eskil went for a short swim in the indoor pool. And off to bed.
CORTEZ - MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK
July 12th
Had breakfast in the motel as it was part of the price. The children were tired and slept late. It wasn’t the most charming place to eat and we couldn’t even get a table. But we got some coffee and toast etc. We kept on wondering what the strange beige fluid with lumps in was, and finally Tine asked and was told it was gravy for the biscuits. No thank you. Took some toast and preserves and peanut butter to the room and after having put some food into the two small children we left for Mesa Verde National Park.
It turned out to be quite a long drive to get to the visitor centre and the sights there. The first place we visited was called Spruce Tree House and was about 200ft wide and 90 ft deep and contained 114 rooms which had housed about a 100 people at one time. This sight we could visit ourselves but the next one Cliff Palace we needed tickets and a guide for. The tickets we didn’t mind but we’re no good with guides. They do give some interesting information but they always talk too much and tell you things you already know ;-)
And this one turned out to be no exception. Unfortunately, he wasn’t very easy to understand because he lisped. It started out ok but when we were standing in the middle of the sight in the burning sun and he kept on explaining things any European having listening just a tiny bit to their history lessons knew, we became very impatient and were just about to have a heat stroke. The funny thing was that he actually explained this because a lot of Americans, as he later said, don’t know much about early European history like i.e. the
stone age.
Had to climb some steep ladders getting up again but they were sort of squeezed in between the rocks so even Tine didn’t mind. The guide did, however, show us how the Indians climbed up 800 years ago and they had made small holes in the rock that could give them some kind of help getting up.
One thought as to why they had moved down and made houses in the cliff was that it gave them more space on the plain to grow their crops. Another idea is that it was much cooler in the summer in their underground Kivas and warm in the winter as they kept a temperature of about 60 F even in the winter when it was freezing outside and it gets really cold here in the winter - unbelievable.
Take away for dinner - not very interesting.
July 13
We were all happy with what we had seen yesterday and no one were much encouraged by the long drive, so we thought that we would see a little of Cortez, little being the operative word we discovered. Paul went for a short drive into the Canyon southwest of Cortez
and Tine, Freja and Eskil saw Ice Age 3 in the local cinema and that was a fun film. Passed by Radio Shack to look for a slide cell phone for Freja, but we don’t think it will work in DK and all of them had a commitment. Disappointing.
Went to our favourite local restaurant Kokos and had dinner.
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