// Adventures and Photography from the Colorado Plateau, Rocky Mountains & Beyond
Friday the 13th | Friday, March 13, 2015
This evening it looked like there might be a really nice sunset over the Grand Valley so I hopped into my Jeep and took a quick drive into the North Desert at the base of the Little Book Cliffs to take a few photos. It was a good decision since there were nice clouds over Mount Garfield and the Grand Mesa when the sun set.
1 CommentSunday, March 8, 2015
Since I’ve been busy moving these past couple of weeks, we didn’t stray far from home again this weekend. On Sunday morning we woke up early (even after losing an hour of sleep to daylight savings time) and made our way over to the Colorado National Monument to hike a new loop trail I have wanted to try for a while. Ever since I climbed up Otto’s Staircase and visited Otto’s Bathtub last year, I have wanted to combine those trails into a loop across the top of Monument Mesa.
3 CommentsSunday, March 1, 2015
I didn’t get out hiking yesterday like planned, so I had to make sure that I got outside today! I decided to head over to the Black Ridge Canyons Wilderness near Fruita this afternoon and hiked the Pollock Bench Loop which follows the edge of the higher bench between Flume Creek Canyon and the East Fork of Pollock Canyon. While I really dislike having to post photos that really aren’t that great on my blog, I can’t always hike in great photographic conditions all the time and today was one of those days. With another winter storm moving into the area, the sky was overcast all day and the conditions outside were generally gloomy. Aside from the gray skies the temperature out was very comfortable for hiking and it never rained or snowed while I was on the trail. The complete loop ended up being about 7 miles in length.
Leave a CommentSaturday – Monday, February 14-16, 2015
Diane and I spent Valentine’s Day and the long President’s Day weekend on Cedar Mesa for our very first camping trip of the year. We setup our base-camp at the Natural Bridges National Monument campground and enjoyed the beautiful spring-like weather all weekend. The temperature never dropped below freezing at night and was a very comfortable mid-sixties during the day. It was nice hiking weather in the middle of February and a great time to get outside to explore the Colorado Plateau! We spent the weekend revisiting a few ruins and searching remote canyons for new ones. Here are plenty of photos from our weekend adventure!
10 CommentsSaturday, January 17, 2015
After spending a lazy morning at home we decided head over to the Colorado National Monument in the late afternoon to get some hiking in. Last year when scouting for a connecting trail between Monument Canyon and the Precambrian Bench Trail, we came across a faint trail that went into Monument Canyon below Mushroom Rock that we wanted to explore further. We decided to follow that trail this afternoon to see if it would eventually connected to the main Monument Canyon trail. We started at the White Rocks trailhead and climbed the steep trail into Gold Star Canyon onto the Precambrian Bench and hiked around the point of Monument Mesa under Mushroom Rock. The trail got pretty hard to follow once we were in Monument Canyon, but we managed to keep on track with a few minor detours. Unfortunately, we ran out of time and had to turn around before reaching the end of the trail. We never did find a connection to the main Monument Canyon trail, and we had continued well past the point where the main trail went up a side canyon. We will have to return another time to find out where this trail goes and explore more of the upper reaches of Monument Canyon.
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