Memorial Day Weekend Celebrations

Over this past weekend Renae and I, as members of the Grand Valley Combined Honor Guard, participated in a Flag Retreat and Retirement Ceremony on May 25th and Memorial Day Service on May 26th. During the Flag Retreat and Retirement Ceremony Renae and I, were in charge of the Retirement Flag and commanding the Rifle/Flag Detail, respectively. The honor guard brought down the Garrison size American Flag as it was rendered unservicable. During this ceremony the honor guard commander, Bob Henderson, cut the smaller flag that Renae had and it was properly disposed of by flame and with dignity. On May 26th we participated in the Memorial Day Service presentations were made by Sen. Penry, Sen. King, and Sen Buscher, as well as, a class from Holy Family Catholic School. The honor guard then completed a memorial service for all veterans who have passed away this past year. We were proud to participate in the ceremonies have each of us served our country in order to gain the freedom to have this day to remember others.

Devil's Canyon, Fruita, CO

Renae's youngest son Roby called and said he could go hiking, so after work Roby, Katie, and Kaleb (Renae's grandchildren) came over to the house. We 3 adults, 2 children (in car seats) and three dogs piled into Renae's Outback and stopped by KFC then headed out to Fruita. I must say it was an adventure from the start with a car full. When we got to the trailhead we ate our KFC first, Bandit and Zeus got into a brawl in the back of the car (ending with Bandit falling out of the car and a minor cut to his lip), and off we went. But not to far because Katie indicated she had to pee and then saw the outhouse and then had to poop (apparently the outhouse, porta potty is somehow seen as a fun place to be by a three year old). We all laughed and headed down the road again. The main trail in Devil's Canyon appears to be just that a graveled road. Being the adventurous sort that we are when we got to a trail divider we took the D4 trail. This was a pretty cool trail because it took you right up to the rock formations which the kids loved climbing into the "holes" in the rock and wanted nana Renae to take pictures of them. After looking at the map we picked up at the trail head we decided that to complete the entire loop (which looked to be about 5 miles) would be a bit to much for the kids so we blazed our own trail, careful not to step on fragile soil. This cut the loop in half and probably a little more. The kids enjoyed the rock formations, playing in the holes and jumping/hiking with Roby and Renae. It didn't rain on us although this girl from Kansas was looking at the clouds and thunderheads (Renae makes fun of this). It was a really fun hike, we spent maybe an hour actually hiking. There is only water at the beginning of the trailhead that I could tell. We will definitely head back and check out this area more. From this trailhead you can follow a trail over to the F1 trail at Pollock Bench. We only had a disposable camera so once the pictures are developed I will post pictures.

Castleton Tower and Onion Creek

After hiking Negro Bill's canyon, we were going to hang and then hike Delicate Arch and get there to watch the sun set, which as I understand is an amazing view. Well apparently the national park doesn't allow dogs on any of the hiking trails (and seeing as we had three) and it being overcast that evening we didn't go hiking in the Arches National Park. We instead found a place to car camp at the second Big Bend "recreation area" headed out of Moab. When we got up the next morning we hit the Pancake Haus in Moab for breakfast and then headed to Castle Valley. Which from the roadside information made it sound like there would be a ghost town and many neato hikes. Well I've come to find that no matter how many maps one buys (by the way if anyone needs a map for the MOAB, Blanding, and Monticello area check with me as I have a bizillion) unless they mark the trailheads the map does no good. Renae and I drove past Castle Valley which is apparently a small community of live people not ghosts and saw a road where several guys with trucks (imagine that) were parked. We flipped a U and parked there too. Come to find out it is the trailhead to Castleton Tower and the guy that runs the property (private land) from Utah Open Lands was there. He told us sure take the dogs but I would like you to stay on trail as many people go around the 5 foot scramble because the dogs can't make it up. Again guy said "A" 5 foot scramble. No problem we said so we put on our day packs and headed up the trail. Well we hit the first 5 foot scramble within a matter of minutes, not to much problem with that. All the dogs made it up with little to no difficulty. At this point we learned Bandit is a rock hound, he very quickly makes it up these rocks. The second 5 foot rock scramble proved only slightly more difficult than the first. After some negotiating all three dogs made it up the rock. However the third 5 foot rock scramble proved more difficult even for humans. See picture of dog claw marks (technical note, just because I wanted to put a picture right here in the text doesn't mean it goes there, see bottom picture above for claw marks). Anywho Bandit was the only one that made it up this with no real difficulty. The forth and less technical 5.9 route (just kidding) all made it up with little difficulty (it would be coming back down that would prove interesting). After finishing with our rock scramble we saw the Castleton Tower which was a monolith of a rock jutting up from bookcliff like formations (see picture of monolith and Bandit ((it is still several miles off in the distant but it looks like bandit is near it)). There are more flowers here than I have ever seen in a desert of course this desert is at 5,000 feet above sea level. The blue bells are very pretty as are all the flowers in bloom here. Renae and I deciding we didn't want to continue hiking upwards decided to follow a jeep trail along the canyon bottom for a while. There was no water here so we only hiked along for about 30-45 minutes. The next picture is of me on a boulder I climbed with bandit. So we headed back to the 5 foot scramble to get back to the car. Second thing learned is that if you throw Zeus down the rock (ok maybe a gentle push) he gets down a lot faster than if he trys to manly find his way down. This is what happened on the second down scramble because the first took 15 min for him to decide the way we came down was indeed the best way. This also continued on the third down scramble because in trying to COAX Zeus down I pulled his collar off his head so he paced back and forth looking for the best way down for 15 more minutes, to much disgust from Renae and yes she does speak good French. We reached the car after about 2 miles of hiking and decided to stop at the Red Cliffs Lodge to see how much their horseback riding cost. After that (no, no horseback riding) he stopped at Onion Creek. For those of you that hate off road vehicles, motorcycles, ATV's, and little golf cart looking things with big tires you will not like this trail or area. Renae and I decided to drive up the road a bit "just to see" says Renae. Well she splashed 2 motorcycle riders and a ATV rider in the creek crossing. Which by the way we did 24 times in the round trip "just to see". Apparently the creek crosses the trail/road 27 times to it's terminal point. This road was littered with campers and tents, which really suprised me given the traffic on the road and the creek crossings. It had really cool rock formations and the dogs were happy to stop and play in the water. After heading out of this area we stopped one more time and then back to Fruita for Munchies and lunch (for those of you who don't know Munchies is a hamburger joint in Fruita).

Negro Bill's Canyon

I thought this was a rather unusal name for a hike. But learned that it named after the first non-white settler in Moab. Renae and I printed off some information for this hike as I was to be in the Moab area for work and she decided to meet me there to go hiking and camping. Well I don't know about you but trusting information printed off the internet who knows how long ago isn't to be trusted in life and death situations (not that we had any, just a flare of dramatics). First it said the trail head was hard to find, please it is 3 miles from Moab how hard to find can it be, not to mention it is the over flow parking for the mountain bikers. Second the internet information indicates there is the second longest natural bridge here, Morning Glory Bridge, but in a secretive manner you have to follow a hardly noticable side trail, please, really it is the main trail and rather well used and marked considering there were probably 30 people on the trail. And we met JoJo and Parley the dogs along with a few others that didn't give there names. And this is all before we even hit the trail. So in the haste to hit the trail between the couple carrying the toddler and the bus load of angst ridden teens I forgot to put new batteries in the camera so there are not quite as many pictures of Negro Bill's Canyon as what normally would have been taken, but we still got some. This was actually a rather enjoyable hike along and often crossing a unnamed stream. It would seem that this stream flows most of the year so would be a great hike in the summer time and since it is in a canyon wouldn't be unbearable in the heat. Although there is a bit of ridge walking. The only thing the internet print off got right was that the trail crossed the river and is also littered with lots of poison ivy (sorry mom you won't be able to take this hike). The dogs had their packs on which again everyone commented on dogs with packs as if it was such an odd thing like seeing an alien or something. After about an hour and 15 min we reached the natural bridge. Many of the catus were in bloom and brought much color to the canyon hike. On this hike we discovered several things some of which are previously mentioned. But also that Zeus, the ever ready to hike dog, is in personality much like a human man in that he doesn't stop to ask for directions and he thinks he knows the best way (which sometimes he is correct in). I also got to try out my new day pack the Osprey Talon 22, which I absolutely enjoy. I know this isn't much about the hike itself, it is more about the adventure. Overall both Renae and I enjoyed the hike and I know the dogs did. The first picture is of some flowers we saw along the way, the second picture is of Bandit (RJ's dog) standing the lone sentinal, and third is Renae pointing out the bridge. The overall mileage for this hike is just shy of 5 miles RT.