Spring Flowers and Easter Jeep Safari

Spring Flowers:

Our winter has been a very wet one with Arizona receiving record amounts of rain and the higher areas getting record snow falls.  All this moisture almost always guarantees an abundance of Spring desert flowers and we weren't disappointed.

Globemallow

Mexican Poppy

 

Desert Chicory

Field of Mexican Poppy and bluedick.

Bladderpod

Globemallow

Brittlebush

Easter Jeep Safari:

In between Spring flower viewing and local off-roading, we also prepared the Jeep and motorhome for the annual trek to Easter Jeep Safari in Moab, UT.  This was our 11th year attending the event but this gathering has been going for 57 years. It is organized by the hard working members of the Red Rock 4-Wheelers club. There are over 35 different 4-wheeling trails to choose from ranging from beginner to extreme terrain. We enjoy going to run some of the trails, see the beauty of the area, look at all the different types of Jeeps, vender show and meet up with friends. 

Our route usually takes us through Flagstaff, AZ with our first overnight stop in Bluff, Utah. The Bluff area offers beautiful scenery, history and interesting sights. This year we explored West of Bluff to nearby Mexican Hat and to the start of Monument Valley just to peek into the Valley and get a geocache. Yes, this the spot where Forest Gump stopped his cross country run and said "I'm pretty tired... think I'll go home now".    

 Monument Valley - This photo was taken from the roadside pullout because we didn't want to stand in the middle of the road dodging cars speeding by to take the photo!!! 

Mexican Hat formation near Mexican Hat, Utah.

Unique rock formation called Church Rock but it sure looks like a bee hive to us.

Once we arrived at our RV spot for the week in Moab we were in awe of the snow capped La Sal Mountains out our RV's front window.

La Sal Mountains, Utah

View from our RV site of the snow covered La Sal Mountains

View of the Moab red rocks and La Sal mountains in the background.

View from motorhome window.

We had a couple days to do some touring on our own before we attended our scheduled trail runs for the week.  So I talked Jack into some geocaching and shopping. The geocaching took us to some places we had not explored yet; like some unique caves.  YES... The Geocache app said there was a cache to be found in these caves! Sources state that the caves were first dug in the 1950's to be a house but was abandoned and unfinished. Later they were to be used as movie sets in the Indiana Jones movie.  So equipped with flashlight, cell phone and ink pin we ventured into the unknown to find the cache and take a look inside the caves. We were happy to log a First To Find (FTF) cache at this location. So, we were successful without fighting off tomb raiders or snakes and the walls did not close in on us once we removed the treasure from its hiding spot.  Plus, it was fun to just explore the caves.

Caves cut into the sandstone.

View from inside cave looking down at our Jeep and the beautiful red rock.

Interior rooms of cave.

After caving we went on another geocache hunt that brought us to some historical graffiti from the 1900s and petroglyphs from native Americans around 1200s . If these walls could talk I wonder what they would say. 

Trail #1:  Tip Toe Through Hell

Our first EJS event trail was picked and driven by Deb, which runs (tip toes) through the premier trail of Moab... 'Hell's Revenge'.  This trail had long stretches of sandstone slick rock with steep climbs and descents with some narrow edges that made for some slightly sweaty hands while driving.  LOL  Once we crested some of the slick rock we were greeted with large vistas of the snow capped La Sal Mountains, Arches National Park plus the cliffs overlooking Moab Valley.  We thoroughly enjoyed driving this trail.

Typical Hell's Revenge driving terrain

Red Rock views abound

Trail #2: Hey Joe Canyon

Hey Joe Canyon is a trail that meanders on the ledges of Spring Canyon, Labyrinth Canyon  and next to the Green River.  The trail starts at the top of the canyon and transverses ledges (single lane shelf road) until we were right next to the river and then went 9 miles up river.  There were several fallen rock obstacles where we had to go over because we were on a trail that has a canyon wall on one side and the river edge or cliff on the other and no where to go around. The trail ended at an old Uranium mine area dotted with old equipment and remnants left behind from the 40's/50's.

The muddy Green river

An old air compressor powered by a straight 6 CAT engine mounted on a towable steel wheel cart.

Found a fixer upper truck

Hooray  we were able to spot Desert Bighorn Sheep as we were exiting the trail.
Perfect way to end the day.

Trail #3: Cliff Hanger 

This trail was a bucket list trail for Jack. This is one of the longest and toughest days we have had since 4-wheeling in Moab. Forewarned some Jeeps were damaged on this trail. Luckily, we only sustained minor fixable damage (bent tie rod bar).

The trail started instantly from the roadway where you had to maneuver down rock ledges and then almost immediately after that we were faced with a large boulder wall to get up and over.  From there it seemed like a consistent series of obstacles that tested the ability of rigs and drivers.  The actual Cliffhanger obstacle was a big ledge on a narrow shelf trail overlooking Jackson Hole some 1000 feet below. Yes it was tough going down and tougher going up on the way out. The trail ended at a spectacular overlook of the Colorado River and miles of red rock and mountains scenery. We enjoyed our lunch, took in the scenery and then packed up and made the return trip over all the obstacles we had battled coming in.  Testing the 'rock sliders' and skid plates the whole way.

 

The first 3 foot ledge to get up 

Another rock face to climb

As we climbed the canyon walls to the mesa top, the scenery was getting better 

Just getting to the top was the hard part

About to test the rock sliders and trying to keep from getting high centered (turtled) 

Up on top...what can I say just look at this view!

More of the red rocks of the Moab  

Heading up the 'Cliffhanger' obstacle

Getting some 'flexing' in

Going down the 3 foot ledge is easier.

One of the final tough rock crawls to get off the trail
 (the rear wheels just pulled up out of a 4 foot deep pit)

So that's a wrap - We enjoyed our adventure in Moab and plan to return next year. 

Happy Travels,

Our Jeep was 'ducked' while in Moab. What does it mean you ask. It is an act of kindness where Jeep owners place rubber ducks on other Jeeps to let them know that they have a nice Jeep. Simple concept but sure brings a smile to your face.