Leslie and David's Wanderings: 7 May 2021 Arches Finally!

After having been turned back last Monday, we made sure we were up early this morning. We reached the entrance to Arches at 8:45 and found a long double line of vehicles. It took us 45 minutes to reach the entrance fee station! Once through, we headed directly for our first hike since we knew the parking would be limited. We got lucky when we pulled up to the Windows Section of the park and got a parking spot for the Behemoth as someone else was leaving. There were a lot of people taking at least a portion of this hike. We did the full Window Loop Trail (1.3 Miles, 272 feet of elevation gain, 809 calories burned) from which we were able to view the North Window Arch, South Window Arch (front and back) and Turret Arch. Completing that, we hiked around the parking area to the Double Arch Trail (0.6 miles, 125 feet of altitude gain, 593 calories burned). Again, there were lots of people and kids, but the views of these magnificent rock arches overshadowed all the annoying noise and people. Finishing up there, we drove to the Garden of Eden overlook for a quiet place to enjoy lunch. Figuring that Delicate Arch was still extremely busy, we headed to the Devils Garden area of the park. Along the way, we stopped at the Fiery Furnace overlook and Salt Valley overlook. We had thought about doing the Fiery Furnace trail, but you have to have a permit and they are really hard to get hold of this time of year according to the ranger. Besides which some of the scrambles may be more than Leslie’s knee can take. We stopped at the Sand Dunes Arch and hiked the 0.2 mile trail to the arch. You are walking between these two towering fins of red rock on accumulated wind blown sand. The arch is off in a side alcove that you could walk past if you were not looking for it. When we arrived at the Devils garden, there was a surprising amount of parking available. Our plan was to hike to the Landscape Arch and maybe beyond to two other arches. The temperatures had climbed to over 90 degrees and we were feeling it. The Landscape Arch Trail (2.1 miles, 299 feet of altitude gain, 937 calories burned) is a very well traveled and graded trail. There were nor scrambles over rocks or huge steps to clamber over. Landscape Arch is beautiful and very iconic. Back in September 1991, a large section of rock (180 tons) fell from the arch (scaring the crap out of some hikers). The park service closed the area under the arch to visitors fearing more of the arch will tumble off. Beyond the Landscape Arch, David forged a head on the trail and saw it climbed a very steep slickrock for quite a distance and knew that we were not up for that climb. So we turned around, taking advantage of the few shady spots on the trail to cool off. Making it back to the Behemoth, we sat for a few minutes to regroup in the wonderful air conditioning. We headed next to Delicate Arch, figuring that being late in the day, there would not be so many people. We were correct, there was almost no one at the Delicate Arch overlook. It looks so out of sorts sitting on top of that huge stretch of slick rock all by itself. We have talked about doing the delicate arch trail, but want to do it on a cool morning since that huge slab of slickrock heats up all day and bakes hikers. Four Hikes, 9 Arches, 4.2 miles hiking, 750 feet of altitude gained, 92 degrees with a relative humidity of 8% was all we felt like doing in one day! So we headed for the visitor center, wanting to get there before it closed. But we did stop on the way at the Balanced Rock and hiked around it a bit looking for that perfect camera angle. We arrived at the visitor center 15 minutes before the store closed (the visitor center and exhibits are still closed due to COVID). Leslie picked up her post cards, David his park hat and another NP coffee cup, as well as our park stamp for our NP Passport book. It was a wonderful day!