Running for Utah, the edge of the Great Basin

This morning in Grand Junction, Colorado, we awoke to the same sounds we fell asleep to, that of a legion of pet dogs, both tiny and massive, announcing that their human caretakers were still remiss in their duties, much as they'd been for the several hours before we turned the lights out. I kid you not. If you combined all the dogs we've seen on this voyage, in every camp site from Washington to Illinois, and from South Dakota to Colorado, they would not in their entirety add up to the menagerie present at the Grand Junction KOA yesterday. I thought at first we had wandered into a dog convention, since virtually every RV seemed to contain one to several. One traveler had set up, I'm sure with the park manager's permission, a dog grooming salon in the door yard outside her fifth wheel. I was dumbfounded! I swear that I saw everything from the tiniest hood ornament-like dogs to a pony-sized St. Bernard stroll by our windows. Most people out walking their charges had anywhere from two to four on leashes, the existence of which I was certainly glad for. Had all of these carnivores gotten loose at one time, I, as a non dog aficionado, might have been devoured before I could retrieve my shootin' iron. So it was that Concetta and I cleared out of Grand Junction this morning as fast as we could to put the barking din behind us. Our present camp in Price, Utah, seems to be entirely devoid of creatures, at least so far. Let's hope it remains so.

Okay, well, enough of that rant. Today our goal was to leave Grand Junction on Interstate 70, a necessity for moving on toward Utah though, as you know, we always try and stay away from the Interstates. This time we needed I70 to get to the turnoff to the town of Moab, Utah, which lies south of the Arches National Park. Our intention was to skirt to the east of the Park, have lunch in Moab and stock up on supplies, then take a more westerly road, Highway 191, which skirts the park on the west side and drive north toward the Salt Lake City area.

Let me just say, that even though we had to skip the Arches area this trip, the country we saw as we drove to and from Moab was nothing short of stunning. Huge mesas of massive sandstone layers and interspersing volcanic layers stood out against the azure sky like rubies on a blue satin cloth. I stopped for photographs so often I think our average speed today was probably about 20 miles per hour.

Moab is a very interesting town. My earliest memories of Moab are derived from reading Edward Abbey's, Desert Solitaire in my youth. If you haven't read it, make it your goal to do so before you visit Moab. Abbey was one of the very first "vocal" environmentalists. He wrote many books on nature and man's misuse of it, Desert Solitaire being only the first. In that book Abbey is a park ranger stationed in the Moab area, though if I remember right, he lived in a mobile or travel trailer in the Arches National Park. His perceptions of the average park-using tourists were just wonderful, and made him an icon in the environmental movement overnight.

So, why do I bring Abbey up? Well, it's because Moab has become the outdoor adventurer's nirvana of the West. Everywhere -- and I mean EVERYWHERE -- you look all you see are twenty-something kids driving Rubicon Jeeps piled high with, bicycles, kayaks, and camping gear. Every other business proclaims that they are THE best place to sign up for your raft trip on the Colorado. There are ATV and Humvee tours to the back country in case all you have is a city-sized motor home and want to get out and tear up some real estate before you get back to the suburbs. Bike rentals, outdoor gear for sale, and adds for vacation packages are plastered everywhere.

And I was astounded to see how healthy everyone looked. Even the guy slicing Virginia Ham for me at the deli counter at Moab's "City Market" looked lean and fit, like he taught distance swimming or downhill skiing in his off hours. Most of the customers in the store appeared to be just taking a necessary break before they did their next 10 mile hike into the wilderness. The parking lot of the store was jammed with tourists, many driving rented motor homes. Two different couples I passed in the super market isles were speaking foreign languages, one I put down as Swedish, the other, well, my best guess was one of the ex-eastern block countries. Just exactly who comes from the old Soviet Bloc to go biking in the Utah desert? Well, if you take a look at Moab, you'll decide that it's probably lots of folks.

Anyway, I think if Edward Abbey wasn't already dead he'd probably have thrown himself off one of the arches the first time he encountered this modern onslaught of tourists. I can almost hear him -- I was probably 18 when I read his book -- and complaining that we're making the wilderness far too easy to access for the wildernesses own good. Man, back in 1968 he just had no idea, no idea at all.

Okay, enough of that rant as well. I don't want to discourage you from going to Moab and having fun, though I would surely pick an "off season" vacation if you can. Concetta and I thought that the Utah wilderness that we saw today was some of the most awe-inspiring yet. Personally, I just love those lofty mesas you see out here that tower above the valley floor, knowing that they rose straight up out of the surrounding terrain. I find it fascinating to note the different strata of rocks and sandstones, soft layers followed by hard layers, back and forth. It makes for some of the most interesting geology you'll ever see. And imagining the forces that were necessary to thrust those mesas skyward always makes me appreciate the awesome power of earth's internal mechanisms.

Speaking of mechanisms, I had a chance when we landed in camp this afternoon to photograph the drive-up ramp that I spoke of in yesterday's blog. If you haven't already caught the update, you might want to go take a look.

And while I'm on the subject of mechanisms, I was presented with a different sort of problem when hooking up the sewer line today when we got to our present camp. Let me say first that at every camp that offers "full hookups," you will find a sewer outlet next to your space accompanied by an electrical connection box and a faucet for your fresh water connection. The sewer is usually a four inch plastic pipe sticking out of the ground anywhere from zero inches to four or five inches. Those heights are best. Those heights allow you to use what I call an "accordion" unit, a contraption that is much like an old-time string of paper dolls, all hinged together, that you extend out from the coach sewer outlet to the standpipe in the ground. Unlike the paper doll metaphor, the "accordion" extends out in a steadily decreasing height so that it's highest next to the coach and lowest next to the sewer stand pipe. The interior of the "accordion" is rounded so your flexible plastic sewer hose snuggles right down inside and is held firmly. So, you hook up one end of your sewer pipe to the coaches' outlet pipe, one end to the standpipe on the ground, lay the whole thing in the "accordion," and you're good to go.

But if you find a stand pipe, as I did today, sticking out of the ground a good ten inches? Now your "accordion" is way to low at the standpipe end. I'm sure you know what they say about s**t running downhill. You just have to have a downhill slope to get things moving in the direction you want them to go. Of course, I've seen other campers who don't seem to care about this aspect of gravity one bit. Those are the guys who tend to lay their hoses right on the ground and then at the standpipe end the hose suddenly has to make a four or five inch leap into the air to do its job. I just shake my head trying to imagine just how that technique is able to completely clear the pipe before the pipe is stowed away in the coach.

Fortunately, the previous owners of this coach solved the problem of what to do when park owners don't know s**t from Shinola (as my Dad used to say) about how far above ground to construct their standpipes. Those previous owners bequeathed to me a couple of lengths of six-foot plastic home gutter material, the kind that's sort of U-shaped. I've only had to use them a couple of times but they are absolutely essential when you encounter the too-high standpipe problem.

In my basement lockers I have a variety of "containers" for storing things. For all the water-related gear I have a galvanized tub about thirty inches in diameter. For all the sewer related gear I have a rectangular plastic tub normally used to mix mortar for doing brick work. I think I found both at Home Depot. Today I dumped everything out of the containers, upended them next to the coach, and, along with some wooden blocks, used them to support a length of the gutter material. Since the galvanized tub was taller than the plastic tub, they formed a natural incline for the gutter material to rest on. That done, I installed the plastic sewer pipe, resting it inside the gutter, and voila! My sewer connection was at the right height for the standpipe, inclined perfectly to ease the flow of, well, whatever, and looked neat in the bargain.

So that's it for now. In future issues of the Blog I'll try and address other problems we've encountered and, hopefully, conquered. This trip is drawing to a close, unfortunately, but we've had so much fun that I predict that we'll soon be on the road again. Today we listened to some of our treasure trove of music from Wally World as we ate up the miles between Moab and Price, Utah. Two of the CDs I grabbed were America's greatest hits and Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water. Predictably, both albums contained songs about traveling. I think that we can safely assume that more travel is in store for the Happy Wanderers. Not sure when, and not sure where, but it's on the horizon as we speak and will hove into view before we know it.

Tomorrow we're going to kill a few hours here in Price before we hit the road and head west. It's reported that they not only have a prehistoric museum hereabouts for Concetta, but a railroad museum for yours truly. What more could anyone want? So stay tuned. We're not done yet, not by a long shot.

Until next time, we wish you good food, good wine, and quiet pets (Concetta told me not to say that last part).

Ciao.