We started the day with a drive down Kane Creek Boulevard, a road that runs from in town down along the Colorado River. Our first stop was at Matheson Wetlands Preserve, a tract of land set aside to protect the unusual wetlands here. The scene is striking and beautiful: Wooded marsh areas in the desert with red cliffs behind.
Further along the road, the cliffs rise up on both sides of the river. and we realized there were quite a few ORVs on the road. There was good reason for that: it turns out that the c
anyons in this area are prime real estate for off road activities. While we moved up the dirt road in 1st and 2nd gear, jeeps and ORVs buzzed by us leaving us to literally eat their dust. We could hear motorbikers and see bicyclists on the trails in the canyon. The scenery was spectacular. At one point the road transitioned to switchbacks to climb a cliff, and the edge of the road dropped away precipitously.
Further along the road, we noted climbers hugging the rock faces of the canyon. When the road became too rough for our little Elantra (and us), we turned around and retraced our route.
We headed back to Moab and decided to take the road on the other side of the river, built originally to service the potash mines in the area. It passes by sheer rock walls popular with climbers, dinosaur footprints and Indian petroglyphs. We stopped at the trail to the dinosaur tracks and took the steep 1/4 mile trail up to them. The only problem came when the trail went straight up the sheer face of the rock hill. No way Jose. We headed back to the trailhead. It turned out that we could see the tracks embedded in the rock from the parking lot.
We decided to grab some subs and head for Arches for sunset, and returned to what I think was the coolest feature of Arches, the fins.
Photos here: https://photos.app.goo.gl/Hy7S4HYHhPrwuSBt5
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