Return to Virgin, Utah

 

On Tuesday we left Moab and headed west on I-70 to I-15, a new route for us as we usually tend to avoid interstates. I must say, this was the most scenic stretch of interstate we ever remember driving on, and hardly any traffic. After 220 miles we stopped for the night in Beaver, UT at the Beaver Canyon Campground. It’s a rustic park with mostly seasonal rentals, but for the Passport America rate of $13.50/night it was perfect, since we needed to dump and get water, anyway.

No views from our side windows but at least we had a field of horses out our front windshield.

While I washed a couple loads of clothes in the clean, inexpensive laundry room just a short walk from our site, Jim took the opportunity to change the oil in the Lazy Daze and Subaru, despite the lingering aches and pains from his bike fall. We’ve been carrying around oil and filters for awhile and since we had to raise the front end of the RV to get level it was easy to get under. We both enjoyed a long shower after we finished our chores. It was nice to have unlimited water for a change.

On Wednesday we got a late start due to meeting another Lazy Daze owner, Bob, who recently bought a lot at the RV park. He had a lot of things to show us, including a tricked out Jeep and small tent-trailer that he can take off-road just about anywhere. Interesting guy.

Friends Debbie, Annie, and Chris had arrived the previous day and were all settled in at our favorite boondock site near Virgin. We drove up the rutted dirt road a short distance past them and found a fairly level spot to call home for the next couple weeks. Mark and Bobbie are parked a few miles away a bit higher up, where he can get better TV reception for football.

Our view at sunrise.

And sunset.

Yesterday Chris, Mark and Bobbie, and I headed over to the east side of Zion National Park for a hike to Many Pools.

After much uphill over slickrock and passing by many pools, we came to the entrance to a canyon filled with colorful maples. Although the rest of the gang had hiked this area before, they had never tried going up the canyon, so after a lunch break we started working our way up to see how far we could go.

Our path involved quite a bit of bushwacking and rock scrambling.

I pushed myself on many of the scrambles, and was a bit concerned about how I would get down in several places. This one finally did me in. I decided to turn around at this point, while the others continued on, since they weren’t too far from the plateau at the top.

As I slowly made my way back down I came to this dry fall that I didn’t have the nerve to slide down after several attempts. I was going to wait for some help from Mark, but then I found just off to the left there was an easy step of rocks to get down.

I was taking it slow and my hiking partners caught up just as I came back to the slickrock. Shortly after, eagle-eyed Chris spotted a few desert bighorn sheep. They blend in so well.

We all survived to hike another day, and hope Jim feels up to joining us soon.