9-15-16 - Heat Escape - Day 35

                                                     Beautiful Day for exploring


I woke up at 9 am this morning.  I felt really guilty about sleeping so late, until Lauren said he had got up at 8 am.  We were both tired from the 5:30 am wake up call from the hail storm yesterday.

Being we got up so late, after drinking our coffee, we decided to have lunch before we went hiking in Dinosaur National Monument.  As we were eating, we had a knock on the door.  Jim Carver stopped by.  We had a great visit.

We took the the asphalt queen on the gravel road to Josie Morris' cabin and hiked the Box Canyon and Hog Canyon trails.  Very pretty.  I kept thinking how strong Josie must have been to have lived off the land in the middle of nowhere until she was 90 years old.  OMG!!!

                                                             Josie's cabin

                                                                    Hog Canyon trail

                                                               end of Box Canyon trail

On the way back down the dirt road we stopped and took a hike up the hill to find petroglyphs.  It was addictive, the more we found, the more we wanted to find.  We had to be careful as we were looking up the hill side to watch our footing.  Lauren was, (as always,) more adventurous than me.  He went on the little goat trail around the side of the mountain to see what was on the other side, as I was scooting back down on all fours on the loose gravel heading back down.  He saw a beautiful view of Split Mountain and then passed  me by on the way down.   As I have said before, I have a fear of heights.

                                                                       Pano

We thought about going back to camp after we had hiked about 5 miles.  We stopped at the visitor center and checked out the Fossil trail.  It was kind of boring  until we saw a Dinosaur spine in the hill.  Again, we were amazed at the excitement of looking up the hill and finding dinosaur bones.  We now have a new past time, petroglyphs and paleontology.  Who would have thought it??

                                                                     Spine

                                                                         Leg???

                                                                  Another large bone????

                                                             Fish scale fossils (small circles)

When we returned home, Ferny had to come outside. She kept patting, digging, and exploring under our outside rug.  Who knows, maybe she is "digging up bones," she may become a cat paleontologist.

Pictures: https://goo.gl/photos/vHLnKpK6JBfUBC9S9

9-14-16 - Heat Escape - Day 34

                                                              Our wake up call (hail)


It was a nice relaxing sleep last night.  The only concern I had was, if,  I might invade Fernykat's space while she is sleeping at the foot of the bed, by Lauren.  She does bite, (gently,) if I make a mistake and invade her space.

A little after 5 this morning,  I woke up and thought I was in the pine trees of Timberlake with the pine cones hitting the side of the camper.  Only problem, I'm not at Timberlake and we are in a campground with no trees.  Then, it sounded like we had fireworks showering down on the roof of the camper.

All three of us jumped out of bed.  All of us running around, then Fernykat headed back to the closet. It was hailing.  We were sure it was a least golf ball size then Lauren opened the door and it was only about the size of a dime.  Thank goodness.

We also heard a flock of geese honking as the hail was hitting the top of the camper.  Lauren said a few choice words about the hail and the geese.

This afternoon, we went to Vernal and ate at a Chinese restaurant, and did some shopping.  By the time we got back to Jensen, the sun was a shinning.

We rode to the Quarry Entrance of the Dinosaur National Monument.  We had heard that the dinosaur fossils are awesome.  Words cannot describe what it feels like to be looking at at all those fossil bones from billions of years ago that are in that hill.  Too many emotions to write about. If you are ever in the area, you really need to experience this place.

We ate a steak and baked potato for supper tonight then watched the clouds cover and uncover the full moon tonight.  This was so much more relaxing than the start of our day.

Pictures: https://goo.gl/photos/Qq2Ry8H3933p9DMA9

9-13-16 - Heat Escape - Day 33

                            We relocated 43 miles west to Outlaw Trail RV Park in Jensen, Utah.

 After we set up camp, we had bacon and tomato sandwiches for lunch.  Those fresh Colorado tomatoes were good.

                                                               Ferny approved?????


We went back to Dinosaur National Monument to drive Echo Park Road (12 miles of bumpy, dusty, narrow, curvy road,) to see Steamboat Rock. It was very beautiful ride, (except for the road,) Along the road is the old Chew family ranch house, Petroglyphs, and many bumps and curves. (have I mentioned that)

                            

                            

                            

                                                              original RV

                           

                                                               Steamboat Rock


                                    We saw several herds of pronghorns coming and going.

It begin to rain on the way back.  The temperature was 80 degrees when we left camp, at one point it dropped to 46 degrees.  We were in the mid 50's when we returned to camp.

                                                                    Back to Utah

Fernykat insisted on coming outside when we returned home.  She lead me around for a while, then all the sudden she headed to the door.  About the time she got in, the rain started again.  We are in for the night.



Pictures: https://goo.gl/photos/jyPvc3RzMMCEDn8E6

9-12-16 - Heat Escape - Day 32

                                                              Welcome to Rangely

We had a good omelet for breakfast this morning.  We have it down pat.  Lauren was cooking breakfast while I was packing our picnic lunch.

We decided to take a ride to the Quarry entrance of  Dinosaur National Park.  On the way, we stopped in Dinosaur, Colorado and called Jim Carver, (Lauren's classmate from Poplarville), who has been in this area for a few months. We met at the welcome center and had a great visit.

We continued our journey to the national park. It was very a great day for a motorcycle ride.  We decided there is a lot of stuff to do in this area so we checked out RV parks in the area and have found our home for the next week.

                            

When we returned, Fernykat was a little hesitant to come outside.  Being there was no rabbit in sight tonight, she got real bored, real fast, and went back inside.  She is still pouting about leaving Pam and Chuck's.

We kept seeing the rainy looking clouds in the mountains on the way back to camp.  We were lucky enough to get back without getting wet.  As we were grilling pork chops tonight, the rain started, then the rain stopped, and the wind begin to howl.  We feel like we are out to sea sitting inside the camper tonight.

                                               
                                                  All Colorado products to make this beer

Tomorrow is relocation day.


Pictures: https://goo.gl/photos/LbRP29j7X8sc11bo6

9-11-16 - Heat Escape - Day 31

                                               Good Morning from Grand Junction

 Fernykat threw a fit when we left Pam and Chuck's this morning.  She loved it there.

Lauren sounded like a tour guide as we were traveling I 70 West.  He was really getting into the scenery, saying, "70 degrees, at 10:30 am, Colorado National Monument on the left, Book Cliffs on the right." It seemed to calm Fernykat down a little bit.

We stopped in Fruita, Colorado to empty the tanks.  A really nice welcome center with a Vietnam Memorial.

We traveled across Douglas Pass.  It is one of the roughest, tightest, curviest, passes we have been on.  Fernykat usually does not care about the road, but this road added insult to injury.  First off she had to leave Pam and Chuck's, then she had to deal with this.  She was a lot happier once we were over the pass.  And so were the rest of us.

We are camped at Buck "N" Bull Campground in Rangely, Colorado for a couple of nights.  The campground has a little more industry surrounding it than we prefer, but we have all the comforts of home.

We took a gusty, windy, ride to the Dinosaur National Monument starting at the Canyon Visitor Center and ending at Harper's Corner.  Lauren stopped for a break from the wind at a boondocking campsite on the way out of the park.  Then the wind calmed.  It was a lot more pleasant ride out of the park when the wind calmed down. WHEW!

                           

On the way back, we saw several pronghorns, several deer, then a herd of pronghorns with a big ole buck herding his harem to safety.   Beautiful.

When we made it back to camp, Ferny had to come out.  She spotted a rabbit in the driveway.  It kept her interest for a while.  This campground is almost Ferny approved.

We ate chili cheese burgers tonight while watching the sunset.  It was a really pretty sunset, the only problem is all the industrial buildings that are between us and the sunset.  Oh well, it's only a couple of nights, and we can't expect a perfect view every time.

Pictures: https://goo.gl/photos/jx4WNERcH4oDDQR78

9-10-16 - Heat Escape - Day 30

                                                                 Fruita,Co.

We lazed around on this beautiful morning then left the asphalt queen at home and rode in the truck to Rabbit Valley and hiked the 1.6 mile Trail Through Time.  It is a unique place where they found dinosaur skeletons.   According to the signs, some of the bones are still there.  Most of the time, the bones looked like rocks to us.  Guess we aren't Paleontologist.

                                                                 Colorful

We stopped at Graffs Dairy on the way back home.  I had a banana split and Lauren had a wild berry milkshake.  They were both very pretty and very good.

                                                                    tasty

This morning, Lauren announced he wanting to do something we had never done.  To my shock, he wanted to go wine testing. Chuck took us to a couple of the vineyards this afternoon.  The first place we stopped was Whitewater Hill.  The wine server knew her wines and was very informative.  It was a little bit awkward at first, but it didn't take us long to get into the wine tasting. When we left, the server told Lauren that he was no longer a virgin to wine testing.

We visited Ptarmigan Vineyards for wine tasting then went to the actual vineyards.  They had just finished cleaning up after picking the grapes.  The cooler was filled with bins of grapes.  The grapes were smaller in size than what we expected and were very sticky feeling.  We tasted the actual grapes and there were very sweet and good.

                           

It was another fun filled day, doing things we have never done (looked at dinosaur bones, wine tasting, and visiting a vineyard). We finished up the evening with a good ole shrimp boil, after watching another beautiful Colorado sunset.

Tomorrow is moving day.


Pictures: https://goo.gl/photos/JxsxfZxQ2YcaBnMdA