Trail to Peak: The Adventurous Path
Hiking, Exploring, Travel & Adventure
Category: Utah
Ancient Rock Art: The Petroglyphs and Pictographs of Moab
Petroglyphs, an ancient form of rock art, of communication, of pictorial mapping… holds such fascination for me. Perhaps it’s my love of any rock. Or my fascination with the development of creative expression throughout human history, but those ancient pictures, painted or chiselled on cliff faces, are inspiring. Intriguing. They fill my mind with questions. And with stories imagined of lives lived, and the experiences that might have shaped their personalities and the development of our shared culture.
Riding at Dead Horse State Park
Having to turn back on Day One of riding in Moab, separating from the group, was disheartening. Nine kilometres into our ride, I was hacking away with my upper chest in a lot of pain whenever I breathed hard on uphills. Only a third… Continue Reading “Riding at Dead Horse State Park”
Riding My Trusty Steed in Moab
At one time, riding horses in the Moab area, shod with metal shoes, was a treacherous thing. The horses would slip like crazy over the surface of the sandstone. And so the rock earned its name, “slickrock.” Today’s modern steeds are sleek, two wheeled,… Continue Reading “Riding My Trusty Steed in Moab”
A Desert Journey
With my fingertips missing their defining ridges, my legs covered in a bevy of happy bruises, and my heart light from a week spent outdoors, playing on rock, we headed toward Moab Utah for the next stop on our holiday. It was a long… Continue Reading “A Desert Journey”
Sunrise at Canyon Overlook
“Got the headlamps?” “Check.” “Coffees?” “Check.” “Puffies and toques?” “Yep.” We were up before the crack of dawn on our last day in Zion, ready for one last taste of adventure before we had to leave her for the climbing Mecca of Red Rocks… Continue Reading “Sunrise at Canyon Overlook”
Don’t Do Angel’s Landing!
We were up at the lookout by 10am and it was already a GONG SHOW! The lookout, the trail and the chains were so over run with people! With people trying to test their fear limits, doing Angels’ Landing is nothing more than a cloying, mind-numbing traffic jam of an experience. Add to that a spattering of people frozen by fear, their companions trying to talk them through it, hundreds of people full of nervous chatter and giggling, then people trying to take charge of the chaos and bring some order to the situation and you have, in short, a nightmare.
Observation Point: Our Favourite Zion Hike
“I wonder what’s around that corner?!” Famous last words…. And with that utterance, our half-day hike became a full-on, full day, 18km walk in the park. Without a lunch. Rookie mistake.
Zion’s Hidden Canyon
Hidden Canyon is a fantastic hike that lets you romp and scramble and explore a small side canyon that’s perched high above the Zion canyon floor. Hidden Canyon lies in the slit on the right hand side of the photo above. If you look… Continue Reading “Zion’s Hidden Canyon”
Zion’s Little Detour: The Weeping Wall
As a warm-up hike our first day we did a short romp, up through a light rain, to the base of the waterfall that tumbled out of the Weeping Wall. The header image for this post shows it, near my hiking boot, seen from… Continue Reading “Zion’s Little Detour: The Weeping Wall”
If You Go to Zion National Park
Zion National Park is a hiking Mecca in southwest Utah… one of those places that if you like hiking and scrambling, and if you LOVE canyons, you’ve just GOT to go! The sandstone, with its deeply carved slot canyons and its incredible streaks of… Continue Reading “If You Go to Zion National Park”
Do you know your ABCs?
Trail to Peak: The Adventurous Path 