Unfortunately, we had to stop at the visitor's center to get a trail map, and that didn't open til 7:30. But we were able to drive down to the Devil's Garden, the northernmost trailhead in the park. We started out on the trail at a comfortable 75 degrees, sunny, with a nice breeze. The day, and the scenery were absolutely fabulous. The first part of the trail down to Double O Arch was really pretty easy, but then we made the fateful decision to try the primitive trail that makes a circuit around the main trail. The Primitive trail is much more out in the open, with narrow ledges to traverse, and some scrambling on slickrock. (Alex, this is the trail that Dad slid on the slickrock down to the trail below after it had started to rain--remember?) By the time we had started this part of the trail, we had been hiking for about 3 hours. So down the trail we went.
And up the temperature went. And down our water supply went. With my compression sleeve and glove on, I really thought I would melt. Some of the trail is like beach sand, and trudging uphill in 100 degree heat was not really what we wanted to be doing.We'd walk 1/10 mile, then stop in the meager shade provided by a stunted tree, and take a sip of water. The another 1/10 mile etc. In several places on the trail we had to slide down rocks or figure out how to get around them. In one place, we had to navigate around a pool that had thousands of tadpoles in it (like something from a Steven King novel--Where did they come from in the middle of the desert?) I did take a minor toss there.We encountered others on the trail whose question was the same as ours--"Do you know how much longer the trail will go?" Noone really knew. There were no markers on the trail to tell you exactly where you were in relation to the start or finish. But, at any rate, we finished, arriving at Landscape Arch, which meant only 1.7 miles to go on an easier path. When we FINALLY finished (a total of 6.6 miles), we sat in the car with the air conditioning blasting, chugging cold lemonade from the cooler we had prepared. That lemonade was THE BEST!
Once we recovered from that, we moved on to the Windows area of the park, where there are several other arches. We sat in the car (AC blasting, of course) and feasted on PB&J (sound familiar, Alex?) We then hiked up to the Windows arches and the Turret arch. Other than a few obnoxious kids on the trail, it was beautiful.
By then, we were ready to relax. We headed back to the cabin and had a cold drink. Ray convinced me that a dip in the pool would be just the perk me up I needed, and even though I didn't bring a suit, I wore some light shorts and a t-shirt and took a dip. Wow! That was just the ticket! By the pool, the thermometer read 100 degrees in the shade. The air is so dry (8% humidity), that the pool is heated, and when you get out of the pool, you actually feel cold--instant evaporation.
Back at the cabin, we had dinner, watched a video (episode 2 of The Pacific), and decided we'd had enough for the day.
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