Day 3- Arches National Park

Early morning wake up!! We packed up the camp, made some egg sandwiches and coffee and hit the road just in time for sunrise. The drive to Arches National Park was supposed to be approximately 4.5 hrs, but after a little 60mi (accidental) detour and some serious construction, we made it to the park in just under 6hrs. Our delays along with the high, semi dangerous water levels made the Colorado river raft we were planning a no-go. Although in hindsight, we would not have had enough time to raft and see as many arches as we did, so it was probably for the best.

When we got to the Moab, we found an awesome little walk-in campground, and claimed a spot. Once we were good-to-go on the site we drove up the road to the park and plotted our plan of action for maximizing the arches we would see. We saw 12 arches! They were all amazing. We went on a couple little hikes, and one semi long hike (approx 6 mi).  Our favorite arches were: Sue-Wilson Arch, Lauren-Landscape Arch, Jess- Double O Arch, Katie- Double Arch.

Wilson Arch

Double O Arch

Double Arch

Landscape Arch

Sue and KT building a trail marker

When we were done with the hiking, we were starving! We immediately made some din when we got back down to the campground. We haven’t named the dish we created yet, but it semi-resembled Jambalaya, with shrimp rice beans, veggies etc. We had just started our fire, and got settled in when a jeep pulled up to let us know that the water level of the river may or may not flood our campground. There was only one other group there…some gnarly old cowboys (they looked like they knew what they were doing). We collaborated to hammer in a steak at the current water level (which was approximately 6 ft from our original tent location), and monitored the change in water level. We established that the level only crept up about 6 more inches in an hour, so we moved to slightly higher ground and decided to take our chances. (the water would get the old men before us…)

We will see if we get flooded out…Tomorrow is another very early morning. We are waking up in time to pack up camp and hike to the most popular arch, Delicate Arch by sunrise. (note this is the arch on the Utah license plates).

We are pretty excited to go to Colorado tomorrow to stay with Lauren’s friend Chris…we need to shower in a very bad way!