The landscape of central Utah is rugged, wild, strange, and full of raw, natural beauty. It is such a unique place that is only made better by the fact that there is almost no one here enjoying it. We had a couple challenging moments here but we ended up thoroughly enjoying the peace, solitude and adventure this area had to offer.
After leaving a KOA in Cedar City, we went to the other end of the camping spectrum and found a great place to boondock outside of Capitol Reef National Park. We loved this campsite. It was in a large dispersed area overlooking mountains in one direction and backed by rugged cliffs in the other. There were only a couple other RVs (one was another full time family from California) scattered in the area but you would never have known it. I could go trail running from our campsite up the cliffs and onto a ridge overlooking the area. Great place! We had to drive over large rocks to get into the area though. We met someone who cut a power steering line on the rocks and saw where someone else punctured their oil pan. Luckily we made it in and out unscathed!
Our second day in this campsite was a bit challenging. It all started in the morning when Archer decided that she did not want to do some of her schoolwork. I got back from running on the trails that morning to find Jamie and Archer going to war over this. After she finally got on track, we went into Capitol Reef and did a great hike to Cassidy Arch. Cassidy Arch is a large sandstone arch that you can walk over. It was great but a little nerve wracking being a parent with your kids standing on an arch that drops several hundred feet on either side. Capitol Reef National Park is more rugged than the other parks we have been to in Utah – even the trail heads to popular hikes are down dirt roads. Popular is a relative term because there were very few other people in Capitol Reef, which was fine by us! Capitol Reef seems like one of Utah’s hidden gems (even though it is a national park).
The battles began again that night after 8:00 “quiet time”. After 8:00, the kids are supposed to read, maybe draw, but definitely be quiet. You really need that when you live in a 200 sq. ft. box. They were not doing a good job of that this night. They were fighting over a pencil or something and would not listen to us as we tried to talk them through working it out. Smith was the main instigator that night. Jamie and I broke at the same time. We both know that dropping a curse word will get his attention very quickly. Jamie yelled, “Stop f@#$’ing arguing!” and the exact same time I yelled something along the lines of, “Smith, WTF!” That was a fine moment of parenting but it got the job done. We do a really good job spending all day, every day together in a confined space; but, it’s not always Instagram perfect – today was one of those days.
We left the near perfect boondocking spot outside of Capitol Reef and headed to Hanksville, Utah. The drive from Capitol Reef to Hanksville was incredible. The scenery is wild and unlike anything I have ever seen. It is what I would imagine a scenic highway on another planet may look like. We got to the campground in Hanksville to find a sign out front that said, “Stay in our shady RV park.” It ended up working out great but it did feel a little weird because we were pretty much the only ones in the campground.
Hanksville in an interesting place. There are about 200 people that live here and there is not much going on. A great restaurant (Duke’s Slickrock Grill – named after John Wayne) was at the campground through. There was also an interesting sculpture garden next door called Carl’s Critter Garden with lots of prayer flags that said, “Om Shanti Christo.” Apparently, that is from some new age sect of Christianity?
The next day, we went to Goblin Valley State Park. Goblin Valley is named after the sea of hoodoos filling the area that look like goblins and castles. There is a big valley of them that you can hike through. Our plan was to hike through these hoodoos and then climb up into a canyon to rappel down into an area called Goblin’s Lair. From the Lair, we would scramble out of the other end of the canyon and hike back. All did not go exactly as we planned though.
Finding the route up to the Goblin’s Lair rappel was a bit challenging but we eventually found the way. We had to climb and downclimb several areas in the canyon to get to the rappel. The rappel was a free hanging rappel off of a small ledge into a hole that dropped about 80 feet to the bottom of Goblin’s Lair. It was an intimidating rappel if you are not used to that sort of thing. I tried rigging up a practice rappel for Jamie and the kids since it had been several years since they last did it. I set it up in a less than ideal location which only ended up shaking Jamie’s confidence big time. When we got to the hole, I could tell Jamie was very nervous. After I got everything hooked up and got Jamie on the rope, I could just see it in her eyes. She was not confident and was really worried about dropping into the abyss.
Jamie decided not to do the rappel, so we all had to turn back. She made the right decision. I set up an autobrake for a backup in case something went wrong, but Jamie would be on her own once she dropped over the ledge. Jamie had to rappel down first so that she could belay the kids and I had to stay up top to make sure the gear was set up correctly before they dropped over the edge. We still ended up having a great time because it turned out to be an adventure climbing back out of the canyon we had climbed down into. This was one of the few times climbing up was harder than climbing down. This ended up being a great lesson for the kids as well. It is OK to push your limits but if you ever lose confidence, panic, or something doesn’t feel right, you should not be afraid to bail when doing things like this.
On our last day in the area, we went hiking in a slot canyon called Little Wild Horse Canyon. Someone working at the REI in Albuquerque, New Mexico told us about this canyon and how we would all love it. He was right! It was fun to squeeze through the tight spaces between the high walls of the slot canyon and to scramble up the rocks as we climbed the canyon. It was also great to get everyone’s confidence back up.
There were some highs and lows but we loved our time in Central Utah. There are some challenges that come along with spending all this time together and living in such tight quarters but we would not trade it for the world. Smith and I watched one of his first rated R movies together here – The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly. It was a great movie to watch while we are out in the west but I guess that title also describes some of our days on this trip. Sometimes there is bad, sometimes there is ugly, but there is always so much more good.
