Park City to Moab
Summer Vacation 2017, “Out West!”
Day 10: Park City, UT to Dead Horse Canyon State Park to Moab, UT
-
1)A nice drive through much drier countryside
-
⁃Watching Desolation Point arise on the horizon, grow, passing it, and seeing it fade in our rear-view mirrors
-
2)Dead Horse Canyon State Park
-
3)Moab
-
4)Seeing the once-wild, now clearly tamed, Colorado River literally five feet down the embankment off the side parking lot of the Marriott Fairfield Inn, Moab, UT
-
⁃Dad seeing a beaver in the bushes at the bottom of the embankment, then becoming quickly sorry that he talked so loudly to Mom, to let her know to “come quick,” and scaring the beaver off in the process.
Photos:
Our drive:
The Activity Coordinator at Marriott Summit Watch strongly recommended we visit Sundance on our drive to Moab. It was right on the way, so we did.
Sundance is likely best known for its the Sundance Movie Festival, which is hosted at the Sundance Mountain Resort. While I cannot confirm for certain, I do know that The Sundance Kid, from the movie “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,” in which Redford played the role of The Sundance Kid, was from Sundance, Wyoming, which is very near Devils Tower.
Regardless, the resort is in the shadows of Mt. Timpanagos, a beautiful mountain that sported two waterfalls from our vantage point. We’re glad we made the side trip.
We drove through Provo within a half hour or so, and then after exiting I-15, we followed a couple turns in the road where the landscape became more of a desert. Highway 191 is a road of open spaces and few cars.
We did drive on I-70 for a few miles... if we continued driving for another day and a half of so, we could be home... ; )
Dead Horse Point provides a relatively well known image of the beauty of the Colorado River. While the source of the name gives one pause - cowboys apparently did leave the horses there to die - the image of looking across the river and seeing the flat plateau / mesa on the other side is quite well-photographed.
When I realized that the Utah State Park is just outside Moab, we confirmed we’d visit on the drive in.
One word: beautiful!
I personally always figured that the plateau / mesa across the river was the point, but it’s not... the point is the place where all those photographs are captured.
Those images were taken to the right, facing west.
To the left, facing east, you will see these deep blue pools, which contrast so beautifully with the orange and brown of the desert.
Only one posting on the internet shared what they are - potash evaporators.
Ummmmmm?
OK... Potash is Potassium that is in water-soluable form.
Ummmm???
And then... Wikipedia shared the answer:
“Potash /ˈpɒtæʃ/ is any of various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water-soluble form.[1] The name derives from pot ash, which refers to plant ashes soaked in water in a pot, the primary means of manufacturing the product before the industrial era. The word potassium is derived from potash.[2]
Potash is produced worldwide at amounts exceeding 30 million tonnes per year, mostly for use in fertilizers. Various types of fertilizer-potash thus constitute the single largest global industrial use of the element potassium. Potassium was first derived by electrolysis of caustic potash (a.k.a. potassium hydroxide), in 1807.[3]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potash
Another awesome “Abby Tilt” from this trip... she tilted the camera intentionally, to make for a special image!
Happy family
Note: we captured all other photos using ProCamera, by Cocologics.
See also http://vanvooren.us/Photography for more photography links
Links to the rest of this travel journal:
Park City to Moab
Day 10 - Saturday, June 24, 2017
