WooHoo!

Saturday, May 11th

Living just 27 miles from the east entrance and having senior passes makes visiting Zion 'a walk in the park'--literally! Yesterday, for our second day off, we returned to  hike the East Rim trail as far as Jolley Gulch, about 6.2 miles for the round-trip.  The route parallels a wash then gradually switchbacks to the top of a mesa.  After a heavy rain, a seasonal stream plunges 200 feet from the mesa's edge into a narrow canyon.  Although we found several small pools in rocks at the ledge, recent rains obviously haven't been sufficient to create the waterfall.  A pleasant but not spectacular hike.  Not many wildflowers; the only variety we hadn't already seen was fringed gromwell.

Scenes along Zion's East Rim Trail:

 

 

 

 

 

 



The schedule for the next two weeks was posted today: we work four days the first week and three the second. Under those circumstances, being on the job at 6 AM isn't all that bad.

 

 

Looking into Jolley Gulch from East Rim Trail

 





 

 

 



Checkerboard Mesa

The surface of this immense Navajo sandstone monolith is scored  by unexpectedly uniform rectangles resulting from crossbedding (horizontal lines) and stress and erosion forces (vertical lines).

 



The schedule for the next two weeks was posted today: we work four days the first week and three the second. Under those circumstances, being on the job at 6 AM isn't all that bad.

First Day Off

Thursday, May 9th

Without the pressure of reporting to work at 6 AM, we were able to attend an interesting talk at the Kanab library last evening.  To bring attention to conservation and preservation issues,  a young man is hiking, biking, skiing and paddling along the spine of North America from Mexico to Canada.  The focus in this area is to construct tunnels under Highway 89 between Kanab and Page so wildlife can cross without endangering themselves or drivers.

We drove from the RV to Zion's visitor center in less than an hour this morning, hopped on the shuttle and headed up the Angel's Landing trail.  It seemed longer and harder in 2011 than it did today.  Back then we didn't get much beyond Scout Lookout.  Fred went farther than I did and I went farther than the first time.  We met Meryl and George, a friendly couple from Illinois who are spending a month in the area and anxious to find good hikes.

Fred wore his new GoPro helmet cam and received a number of thumbs up and 'cool' comments from other hikers, particularly the young ones.  The video of his climb toward Angel's Landing is pretty scary!  After doing some editing , he'll post it on Youtube.  The link to Fred's video is http://youtu.be/YxPQFA69mU0

An (unflattering) picture of Jan on the trail to Angel's Landing

 

What a Day!

Monday, May 6th

First off, we caught our first--and not likely our only--critter of the season, a little mouse foolish enough to invade our space.  Not a great way to start the day...

When we got to work (at 6 AM), Diane looked awful; she probably had the same stomach bug which tackled Roland on Friday.  We convinced her to go home; we could handle the desk.  The next shift reported at 3:00 so we not only 'flew without a safety net,' we put in a 9-hour day.  The situation gave us a lot of practice and having to figure things out on our own made the day a valuable learning experience.  I just hope we don't have to work 9 hours tomorrow!

We rested at home for a couple of hours and then drove to Kanab to walk around town.  Crossing the parking lot we found a wallet containing a lot of crisp, large denomination bills and several credit cards issued by a Dutch or German
bank, obviously a tourist's vacation funds.  Determined to do the right thing, we walked to the town police station.  And discoverd it closes at 5 PM daily.  However, a sign on the door directed us to the sheriff's office several blocks away.  The man sweeping the entry there informed us that the office had moved 'out near the reservoir' and gestured vaguely south.  A stop at the customer service desk in the grocery store helped us deteremine the new location, several miles out of town.  We arrived and entered a deserted lobby.  A phone on the counter connected to a dispatcher who sent an officer to retrieve the wallet from us.  He said he'd give it to a town policeman tomorrow.  Hopefully tourist and wallet will be reunited successfully.

Our First [Mis] Adventure

Sunday, May 4

After Fred finished work today, we set out to explore Peek-a-Boo slot canyon, about six miles north of Kanab.  Directions to the trailhead mentioned a sandy road but did not warn that it became barely more than tire tracks over dunes within the first mile.
We got stuck when we slowed down to read a directional marker.  Gunning it didn't work.  Four-wheel drive didn't work.  Brush under the tires didn't work.  Shoveling was futile.  Letting air out of the tires plus all of the above finally won our release and, slipping and sliding in the sand, we sped back to the paved road.  Peek-a-Boo will have to wait until we find a less harrowing route.

First Days

Thursday
May 2, 2013

No adventures to report...yet.  Reasons [excuses]:  getting settled, working, chilly and very windy weather.  All should be resolved soon.

WooHoo--we're on our way to becoming full-fledged Front Desk Clerks!  Diane, who is training us, realizes there's a tremendous amount of information to master so she's scheduled us for reduced hours during our first two weeks.  Parry Lodge has 89 rooms, a small gift shop and a restaurant that serves breakfast and lunch so the front desk is a busy place.

Thus far our adventure has been marked by traffic issues--the hours-long back-up in Tennessee, the detour up to Jacob Lake and now the repaving of Route 89 through Kanab.  The town is hoping the project will be finished by May 15th, opening day for the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and the beginning of the tourist season.  Everyone complains about the dust and smell and noise and especially the difficulty of getting around town--side streets open and close several times each day and travel lanes change frequently without being clearly indicated.  Arriving anywhere in town safely and on time is challenging!

We joined the fitness center in town.  It is neither as big nor as well-equipped as the Brevard facility but we're happy to have a place to workout.  I tried a Zumba class yesterday---definitely not the 'gold' (i.e., senior)  variety I'm used to.

We're trying to adjust to Mountain Daylight Time (two hours behind EDT) and to being on duty by 6 AM.

Settling In

April 30th

Scheduling an 'empty' day between arrival and starting work helped tremendously .  Yesterday we got the necessities of water, electric, sewer and propane of operational.  Today we activated the P.O. box and Utah bank account, checked out the local fitness center, had another clubhouse key made, toured the Parry Lodge property, took the Jeep to the car wash, bought meat and produce at the grocery store, found a map of the town, did the laundry and set up the sattelite dish. This turned out to be anything but an empty day.

Here are a few pictures:

Rig and Jeep in place

 

The rustic desert garden

 

Rear of the clubhouse

 

The reading room in the clubhouse

 

The card/game room in the clubhouse

Arrival

Monday, April 29th
Kanab, UT

After the big traffic jam on Thursday, the remainder of our journey was uneventful. We encountered a few brief periods of rain in Oklahoma and Texas and crosswinds in New Mexico but weather presented no problems. KOA camp-grounds are pretty standardized, like McDonald's and Holiday Inns, so our four nights on the road were satisfactory but indistinguishable from each other.

The gentleman who checked us in at the Holbrook, AZ KOA told us that Route 89, the road we'd planned to take to Kanab, was closed because a portion of it had collapsed in February. That meant we'd have to take Route 89A, a longer and more difficult route. Learning from our 2010 experience when we expected the poor RV pull itself and the Jeep up a steep, narrow road with 3000' of elevation gain, we drove separately from Bitter Springs to Kanab, about 100 miles.

Our campground is nestled at the base of a red rock alcove three miles west of Kanab in an area called Settler's Cove. The former restaurant building is now the 'clubhouse' containing two bathrooms with showers, two lavatories, a free washer and dryer, a large room with card/game tables and a reading room with an eclectic collection of books and magazines. Currently, three sites are occupied: us, Deb, who does housekeeping at Parry Lodge, and an older couple we haven't met yet. Except for the two sites already occupied, we had our pick of the park and selected the one next a small rustic desert garden.

We have taken care of most of the chores involved in setting up and settling in but some remain; we'll tackle those tomorrow. I plan to post some pictures of our home for the summer.