Helllooooo world! I’m writing you from the small, quaint little town of Blanding Utah. It’s raining and we’re taking a few hours to hang out at the visitor’s centre to make some breakfast, drink coffee, and do some internetting.
Me, Emma, and Vanie (a 1997 Japanese Toyota Townace mini van) are on a big, 7 week road trip exploring the western US. Nine days in, the trip has been a mind blowing experience discovering the crazy, weird, and beautiful wilderness of Utah’s desert.
We started in Squamish, and beelined down to Utah over two and half days. Our first few sleeps in the van were cooollllddd with lows of -10ºC. We couldn’t believe how winter’y it was around Snoqualmie pass. As the snow thinned out and eventually disappeared around eastern Oregon, we thought the temperature would start going up (it’s the desert right?), but nope, it was still cold as hell.
We made it to Moab in the dark and set up camp just outside of town. We woke up the next day to a surreal land of cacti, massive sandstone towers, arches, and really interesting looking desert terrain. What surprised us the most however was the emptiness and vastness of the land. The land just goes and goes and goes as far as the eye can see without a hint of human activity. It was sooooo cool!!!!
Over the next week, we explored Arches and Cayonlands national parks and drove down to Indian Creek to try our hand at the legendary creek crack climbing. We also climbed our first desert tower!!!!!!
We’re now on our way to Bryce and Zion Canyon, making our way towards St George for more exploration and climbing! Stay tuned next week for another road trip update :-).
PS We’re pooping in bags! Human waste doesn’t decompose in the desert, so we’re carrying big old bags of post-coffee poop :-D
