Arches National Park, UT

September 8^th 14

You know you’re pulling into a National Park when you see an intimidatingly long traffic jam before the entrance.  Loads of curious tourists from all over the world are just waiting for the ‘drives of their lives’.  It is disappointing.  This really is a thing that always makes me feel a bit uncomfortable, feeling that I’m losing my freedom as we're pulling into the park.  Wherever we go, we go there with other tourists wearing flip-flops, constantly bumping into each other, rushing through the national parks’ “cattle corridors”, just to take a picture of whatever monument they want and leave.  In worse case, and unfortunately quite often, they only roll down the window of their rented SUVs to take a pic and carry on driving.  Don’t get me wrong but that is my most common experience from National Parks in the US.

But there’s always so much more to it than just that.  Our luck got better though.  Well sort of.  As we walked down the path trying to avoid being dodged by the crowds of eager tourists, we realised there is a “Primitive trail – Difficult hike” pathway.  Judging by the sign, this won’t be that appealing to those guys wearing flip-flops or their fancy clothing.  So we made a turn.  We started joking that it is actually very easy hike, there’s just sandy surface.  But as we carried on walking, kind of unprepared, considering we are still in the desert and have no water on us cause we didn’t even hope to discover anything like that.  It turned out to be an excellent hike. Nothing too difficult but when it surprises you with no water supply on you it gets quite strenuous.  The beauty, however, and the fact that you finally avoid those fashionable, leisure “hikers/photographers” makes you almost forget about the neglected water.

We saw all those famous arches such as Double O, Landscape, Black and Skyline Arches.  They were all fascinating.  As we got to the Double O arch we kind of lost the trail marks and ended up descending a narrow cave that lead us to the very edge of the boulders.  One of the most amazing panoramic views that we got to see in the Arches National Park.  A great green and orange like dusty plateau with occasional boulders, towers and sandstone fins spread all over the place.  We, however, figured that it didn’t lead anywhere and eventually returned to the original trail, which lead us through the landscape of forming arches.

Returning back to the mainstream area didn’t even bother us anymore.  We were thirsty enough not to care about the crowds and as we got back to the parking lot we kind of pitied the people stumbling in their flip-flops that carried a memory of a crowded place in their solid professional cameras and didn’t even have enough time to appreciate the hidden beauties of the National Park views.

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Thompson Springs, UT

5^th September '14

On our way to the Arches National park we needed a place to camp as it was getting dark and we saw massive cumulonimbus clouds and lightning in our vicinity.  To our “luck”, as we travelled east at the i70 we pulled into a place where the time had been gradually slowing down till it almost stopped.  Thompson Springs used to be a prospective town, located on the interstate 70 and main railway connecting Denver and Salt Lake City, where lots of coal miners used to find their last resort. Unfortunately, the last three decades have been quite uneventful, and as one of the locals said; ‘The school closed down, the trains stopped stopping, the restaurant shut down and people started moving out leaving everything behind.'

Thompson Cyn Rd

The main boulevard boasted with many gems from centrally located train station to many motels and restaurants.  Everything that’s left behind now are abandoned buildings, some still in a really good shape but some in ruins only forming the ghost town nature of Thompsons Springs.  As we explored the main boulevard, we noticed an old pick-up truck cruising around with a kid on its bed.  They most likely realised that there are two strangers roaming around their town and eventually aimed at us through a grass field next to the railway tracks and pulled over to question us.  As it was already getting dark and the stormy background really did add a dose of strangeness to the creepy atmosphere of emptiness, we didn’t feel quite safe.  If you ever watched a movie with a setting in a half-abandoned American town you’d know why.

Closed Cafe

Frontage Rd

Three men in an old shady truck, where one of them was balancing the bumps of their not really carefully chosen direction on the truck’s bed approaching us. Well, that kind of felt like we might no longer find our way back home.  It turned out they were the law of the town.  With the emptying town, the official law enforcement left with it and they, claiming that “there’s no police in the town no more”, only wanted to check up on us and ensure we don’t vandalise their treasures.  In fact after a little chat with them it turned out that there’s quite a sad story behind it all.  People, who left the town, are for no reason holding their properties and refuse to revitalise the town, even if it seems like there might be a little potential for occasional tourism due to its location.

Grocery St

We heard stories about voices in the wind and occasional visual appearance of ghosts, not far from the town where natives’ graveyard is located and native art is decorating the walls of Sego Canyon.  It turned out to be a very friendly encounter and they even gave us some tips on where else to go in the town, let the other nervous locals know that the “two guys from ‘tzecheslovekia’ are around and are harmless”.

Still, seeing all this and having in mind the classic stereotypes of abandoned American towns in the desert we were very hesitant to pitch a tent in this area.  We carried on down the road leading us to the bespoken mountains carrying the native mysteries to find a suitable spot.  Another of those creepy scenes was brought to our minds when we saw headlights in the rear-view mirror that are quite rapidly moving towards us.  We were scared for no reason; it was a campervan doing the same as we are.  Trying to find a safe place to camp.  The dawn brought a very new perspective to it all and as we left with sunshine in our back and a great memory of sleepless night thinking of ways to revive the spirit of Thompson Springs.

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An Old Pontiac 8

How we Wandered through the Goblin Valley, UT

The Crew

The Goblin Valley

Side effects from the heat

Our first destination in the great canyon land in the southwest has become the Goblin Valley State Park.  We were headed down south from Salt Lake City, which in spite of its poor references from people we met on the road surprised us.  It apparently is a city with great cultural habits judging by the artsy decorations in it’s historical downtown and by many invitations for other cultural events.  Joseph Smith’s followers are more than apparent and definitely form a part of the city’s culture and its unnoticeable religious context.

Heat of The Goblin Valley

When we got on Highway 24 towards Hanksville; a small town around 5 miles away from the Goblin Valley, we finally saw the great red canyons and their ruins along the highway and views that we know from all kinds of movies.  It is something strange to see in the middle of a desert and sand dunes and cacti, snakes and poisonous frogs.

We camped probably in the most amazing campground we’ve ever stayed; right underneath one of those red canyon residues that stretches somewhere far up in the sky and crumbles down to the ground from about three quarters of its height.  We didn’t even pitch a tent and headed to the Goblin Valley right away.  We were pleased by the fact that unlike in the Yellowstone National Park we didn’t see that many people and even one of our older camper neighbours told us he is shocked how many people already know about this place.

The Goblin Valley apparently got discovered in the 1920’s when cowboys were looking for herds of wild cows.  It’s a very strange and old geological formation of coastal and sand dunes about as old as 170 million years.  Stunning place to watch a sunset with a storm somewhere in the distance while you freely roam in the valley.  We got lucky for this occasion and were blessed with a rich colourful spectrum that polluted the dusk.

Many thoughts come to your mind seeing something like that and one of the strongest is dreading the day when even this place gets crowded by people and when they will build those wooden corridors reminding you of being run down them like a herd of the wild cattle that is just being sold to its new owner. 

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