When we left Page, AZ the next morning the skies looked clearer but we knew there were isolated thunderstorms in the forecast. Still, we soldiered on with our plans to spend the next couple of days in the Grand Staircase Escalante/Paria Canyon area. There is no lack of things to do and see in this [...]
Our weather luck was wearing out. We had hiked through a brief but annoying thunderstorm on our visit to Landscape Arch and the skies were not looking any better as we drove towards the Needles District of Canyonlands National Park. Canyonlands has several ‘Districts’ and the Needles one was the most convenient for us, therefore [...]
After our lovely time in Great Basin National Park we drove across Utah towards Price Canyon Recreation Area, a BLM area with some nice bouldering and a quiet campground. But at the turnoff we were greeted with a chained gate and a “CAMPGROUND CLOSED” sign. Since we still had plenty of daylight left we decided [...]
Just north of China Lake Naval Weapons Center is a tiny little wilderness area called the Coso Range Wilderness. It’s small, around 50,0o0 acres, with limited access (4WD desert road/old mining road). There are no facilities, no signs, no visitor center. It’s not a place to stop and gawk at nature from paved RV-sized pullouts [...]
On our last full day in the Mojave we visited the Cow Cove petroglyphs in the northern end of the park. This is an amazing collection of petroglyphs and this was our second visit to them (last year’s visit). You can wander the rock piles for hours and hours, discovering all kinds of abstract images [...]
From the moment the passes close each fall, I have serious Eastern Sierra withdrawals. Getting from the Bay Area to the “East Side” in the winter involves a long and circuitous route, undoable in a weekend. Even when the passes are open, I expect a minimum of a five hour drive just to get over [...]
Our last full day of the annual Thanksgiving Trip to the desert was an adventure! We decided to do the run up Warm Springs canyon into Butte Valley, but instead of continuing through the valley and up towards Mengel Pass, we turned off towards Arrastre Springs to explore that area. The day was primarily spent [...]


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