Saturday, January 20, 2018

Seeking warmth

Wednesday, 01/17

It was 7* when Gopher and I went walking about 5am. Anymore, I’m up and about by 4 or so.
Finished the packing and on the road before 9.  Because of the weather and the mountain drive on I-70, I didn’t fill the fresh water tank. Just brought two gallons in bottles to us for the bathroom and bottled water to drink.
Thr welcome Center in Fruita has a nice dump and water fill so I took on water there. Continue on to the Rabbit Valley/McInnis Canyons National Conservation Area.

Rabbit Valley/McInnis Canyons

We’ve stayed here before and driven some of the trails.  A very convenient location at MM 2 in CO.


The winter storm forecast for this weekend seems to be strengthening so we decided to head south toward St. George and, hopefully, explore some areas around here on our way back.

Thursday
Spent the night at the Minersville County Park campground west of Beaver, UT. $20/night. As expected, it was just us. A very nice campground on a large lake. I suspect it’s very popular with the locals come summertime.

Friday
 Instead of getting back on I-15, we took CR-130 south to Cedar City. A nice ride through mostly agricultural land and rather blah high desert.
Drove through the Kolub Canyons section of Zion NP. It’s a five mile one way drive. Out and back.
We drove to Zion NP and stayed at the Watchman Campground. With the pending government shutdown, they would only accept payment for one night.
The weather was nice so we drove all through the park.
Started raining about 9pm. Cold.

Saturday
Cold with a mix of rain, sleet and snow. No sun in sight.
 At about noon time, the campground host came by and we were told everyone must leave the campground that day because of the Trump government shutdown. Because of all the recent rain and the forecast cold weather, the host, who was very familiar with the area, suggested we head to the Sand Hollow SP. That’s where we are now. Full hookup sites at $28/night.
Our camping plans involved disbursed camping in the Hurricane area but the roads would be solid mud. Another day.
Driving here, we saw dozens of Jeeps. Turns out there is a huge rally going on this weekend. There are lots of really serious Jeeps in the campground with us. Fun to look at.

Still can’t figure out how to include photos when using the iPad.