Setting Course for Moab

The four of us ended up eating at a Mexican food joint on Main, and then back to our respective rooms at the same hotel.  The next morning found us headed off to some squiggly line on a map that the snowshoe rental guy pointed us.  He put off the attitude that he was less than helpful, yet very helpful.  Even through the fog of a few pints I had "a feeling".  The Forest Service Road was clean and dry up to the point that we are rim deep in snow.  We unanimously decide to turn back, back to the safety of pavement and road signs.  FiL and wife tell us of a trail that their Realtor showed them yesterday, and we point in that direction.

We pulled up to the trail head and it was, get this, just a few hundred feet from where we XC skied the day before.  How's that for you?  We did a nice little hike down into the valley below where the river and the Durango Narrow Gage RR tracks are nestled.  It was a beautiful hike and then we had to hike climb back out.  Luckily we had not strayed too far.

Packed up and ready to make some time to the promised land of Utah.  I have not been to Utah in over ten years.  The drive back reminded me of moving.  It was a flood of emotions, old scars were suddenly new and pink. Wounds fresh from battle.  My mind raced with images, and clips from the movie of my past.  Mostly good but like they say "you take the good, you take the bad", and there were a few bad apples in the basket.  There were memories that I have not thought upon that came to the surface like it were yesterday.  I really feel that geography can also attach itself into your subconscious and once back in a region or specific place it becomes a trigger.  I'm not talking about seeing, I'm talking about being.  Fragments of yourself that are left behind to be retrieved later, or never.

I never lived in Moab, and I only traveled through when going home or for vacations, but it had the feeling of familiarity.  I felt I knew the place and like I had belonged or do belong. It was good to be here.  We drove straight through town and right to Arches.  This place is huge.  I cannot describe it any better than that.  I like the word enormity.  Giant.  One, Arches is spread out and there is some drive involved in seeing the sights; two, everything is just so big.  We tried to do the express lane drive through and it was still too much.  The sun was leaving for the day, my passenger was becoming bored, I was feeling pressure to entertain my passenger.  Needless to say we left a great deal to see for next time.  I pray there is a next time.

Dead Horse Point is___________.  I can write cliches all night and they would all be true, but never show you what it is to see.  It made my knees weak and my stomach turn.  The void was massive, a negative space that seemed to want to drag me into it, if I stared too long or stood too close.  It had gravity an attractiveness that tugged at my soul and at my flesh.  I couldn't stop.  Looking.  I was an indiscriminate landscape voyeur.  Every vantage point a different pleasure yet it all was of the same.  All of this is too much to take in.  Good thing there is a MTB trail at the visitor center.  Time for some single track.