Well, it finally cooled off a bit last night well after dark. We’re near the river and the humidity of the river may have held heat longer than we’ve had at other sites. We’ve decided to deal with the campsite anther night, and the fact that there are 30 kids in a school group near the cabins had no bearing in our decision.
We went out to Dead Horse State Park and Canyonlands National Park– Islands in the Sky District. We tried to get an earlier start, but even by 8am it was getting hot. Dead Horse State Park is on top of a mesa with a narrow land bridge. Cowboys would heard wild horses across the land bridge and block the opening with brush and tumbleweeds. They would choose the horses they wanted and then (the stories differ here) they would either leave the unwanted horses on the mesa top or the horses couldn’t find their way off the mesa, where they would die of thirst or jump to their death trying to get to the river thousands of feet below. We didn’t see any horse when we were there, dead or alive. The views were great.
We moved on into Canyonlands- Islands in the Sky District. Canyonlands is divided into three districts; The Islands in the Sky, the Needles and the Maze. The Needles and the Maze are harder to get to and many areas require four wheel drive vehicles. The Islands in the Sky is more driver friendly, with mostly paved roads and overlooks. We made our way to Grand View Point at the far end of the park. It had to be well over 90 degrees by 11 am. We then headed back towards Moab for lunch.
We had some really good salads at Eddie McStiff’s in Moab. Andrew and I had “researched” their beers our first night in town and they were acceptable.
Jack and Ellen dropped us off at our campsite to rest and shower before dinner. Andrew and I went to a hardware store to get a bolt to fit our bike rack to replace the paper clip currently holding things together. I feel better about not loosing my bike on the road now. I think it was a that low hanging tree we hit while camping outside of Zion National Park that may have damaged the bolt and with all of the vibration of the dirt roads, it finally gave way.
We went to the office and discussed moving to a cabin for the remaining few days we planned to be here. Meanwhile, Jack and Ellen called Andrew; they have had enough of the desert. They’re ready to drive 4 hours to their house in Edwards, Colorado. We were getting tired of the heat too, and it wasn’t even SUMMER yet. We talked to the camp office about what their cancellation policy was. The owner will be in tomorrow morning and we can settle up with her with only a small cancellation fee.