Minnesota and Arizona 2023:
Day 19 - Grand Lake

	Sunday, June 25, 2023: We had a long day planned, so we were up around 6 AM and out of the motel before 7:00 AM. We got breakfast at McDonald's on the way out of town, ...
	... and then headed south out of Moab. There was a beautiful ridge line on the west side of the road. Check out the color change between the upper part of the ridge and the lower part.
	We passed Wilson Arch about thirty minutes after leaving the motel. It's a huge arch, and it's easily visible from the road.
	Shortly after we made the turn toward Canyonlands National Park, we entered the Indian Creek Unit of Bears Ears National Monument, ...
	... and then a few minutes later, we arrived at Newspaper Rock Petroglyphs. This is one of the largest known collections of petroglyphs, and definitely the easiest to get to.
	The drive was unexpectedly beautiful.
	We were expecting typical desert scrub, but there was lots of greenery, ...
	... and a small watercourse that ran next to the road.
	The area opened up into a wide valley, ...
	... as we reached the eastern part of Canyonlands National Park, called the Needles District.
	There were signs on the fee station that asked us to pay at the visitor center, ...
	... which is where we were headed in any case.
	Here's the Needles Visitor Center, ...
	... and here's the Mather plaque mounted on a rock out front. This one was part of the 1991 casting run and was placed here in a dedication ceremony in 1992.
	We love these topgraphical maps!
	This part shows Dead Horse Point State Park, ...
	... and here's that cool S-curve called The Loop that we went through on our river trip in 2019, ...
	... and here's the confluence of Colorado River and the Green River. The Green comes in from the right and makes the Colorado even mightier (map note: downstream is up).
	We walked around the display area in the Visitor Center, ...
	... and really enjoyed the tadpool life exhibit.
	When we stopped for gas this morning, they didn't have any way to clean the windshield, and our trip this morning had added some large bug debris. We were packing out a bunch of cleaning products from the condo in Arizona, none of which were glass cleaner. What the heck, why not try carpet cleaner to clean glass? And you know what, it worked reasonably well.
	Debbie added to her mini building block model collection with a set depicting Mesa Arch in Canyonlands National Park.
	We admired the gorgeous rock formations on our drive out of the park.
	The cliffs around the valley containing the visitor center are like a miniature Monument Valley.
	Check out these sticky-uppy things on this hill.
	There were two of them, and, not naming names, one of us giggled and said, "Heh heh, they look like boobs."
	You know you're thinking it, too.
	The rock formations were just beautiful.
	As we got back on main highway, we could see the La Sal Mountains off in the distance. It would be faster to go back through Moab and get on the highway, but we were going to drive around the southern side mountains because we've never been that way before.
	We passed Wilson Arch again, which looks amazing from this angle.
	Let's go there. Well, around there.
	We headed east through a portion of the Manti-La Sal National Forest. The main part of the forest is all the way to the northwest near Provo, but there are remote units of the forest out here.
	It was a pretty drive, with very few other cars on the road.
	Welcome to Colorful Colorado! This was the only colorful version of this sign that we've seen so we suspect that a local artist added their own touch.
	Look at all of the green!
	There are tree-covered hills, ...
	... leading to green valleys. This one is named Paradox Valley, and we pulled off at an overlook to get a good view.
	What a beautiful place to have a farm!
	All of the peaks in the surrounding mountains still had snow on them.
	The columbine bloom on the Scenic Byway sign is one of our favorites. We reached the outskirts of Naturita, Colorado, and took a left turn to start our northward journey around the mountains.
	The Dolores River seemed to have overrun its banks at this turn, ...
	... but look how scenic it looks with that snow-capped peak in the far distance.
	We came to a section of the road with bare rock along the righthand side.
	We wound along this section of road for a few miles, ...
	... until we got to a parking area for an overlook. We pulled in and learned about the hanging flume that was built here in the 1880s to transport water to the gold mines in the Dolores Canyon.
	Here's a close-up of what remains of the flume. There was something shiny in the trees at the bottom of the canyon that caught our eye, and when Debbie zoomed in on it, ...
	... we saw that it was the remains of a car that was upside down at the bottom of the canyon.
	We drove for two more hours through scenic landscape, until we reached Grand Junction, Colorado. We were both craving Mexican food so we decided to have a sit-down lunch at Dos Hombres.
	Debbie had the Navajo Taco, which was made with fry bread, ...
	... and Tom got the Fajita Burritos with the Dos Hombres Green Chilis.
	After lunch, we got onto I-70 headed east, driving for a while along the Colorado River.
	Tunnel!
	Pretty mountains!
	We continued along the Colorado River, ...
	... through White River National Forest ...
	... until we got to the Grizzly Creek Rest Area. It was down below the level of the highway, right along the riverside.
	Here's Grizzly Creek. There were walkways built along the Colorado and right out over Grizzly Creek.
	The white water of Grizzly Creek slams into the mighty Colorado River here.
	The soft focus was unintentional but very appropriate as Debbie takes a moment to commune with her river.
	The highway is really cool through this section of the canyon, with the river on one side, ...
	... tunnels, ...
	... and one side of the highway being almost right above the other, as there isn't enough room in the canyon in some spots for them to be side-by-side.
	This was the most we've seen of the Colorado River at one time without being on it in a river boat.
	Check out this house high on the hill overlooking the highway! Is that a hot tub on a deck slightly down the hill to the left?
	Yep. That's a hot tub. When you don't have enough room in your hilltop palace to have a patio, just build a platform lower down and make a walkway to it.
	We got off the highway at Wolcott and headed north. As we got near State Bridge Lodge, the road changed from nicely paved highway to a very rough surface.
	IS THIS ROAD DIRT?
	YES. IT IS DIRT! Come on, Colorado. You really think this is a state highway?!
	This poor elk crossing sign was ridden with bullet holes. Is there nothing else to do in this part of Colorado but shoot at crossing signs?
	Cows.
	It was pretty country. We just wished they would have paved the entire road through it.
	As we joined up with Highway 9, which was paved, we got a photo of the same Colorado River sign that we got in 2019.
	Ah, Kremmling. Thank you for having services.
	We got photos of this sign, too, in 2019, but this time we actually turned to follow the scenic byway.
	See? Scenic!
	We looked closely at every large bird that flew overhead and tried to get photos of any bald eagles, and this time we were successful.
	The hills seemed lower here, but probably because we were at more than 7,000 feet of elevation.
	Snow in the mountains is so pretty.
	We drove through Arapaho National Recreation Area, ...
	... and passed Lake Granby first, ...
	... and then Shadow Mountain Lake.
	The headwaters of the Colorado River are in this area, and this is the first time we'd see a sign for a specific fork of the Colorado River.
	There was a pretty wooden bridge over the inlet between Shadow Mountain Lake and Grand Lake.
	Speaking of Grand Lake, that's the name of the town where we were stopping for the night.
	The Colorado River Headwaters Scenic Byway ended here. Some people consider Grand Lake be the origin of the Colorado River, but the actual headwaters are about twenty miles north of Grand Lake.
	We checked in at the Grand Lake/Rocky Mountain National Park KOA, where we had a cabin reserved for the night.
	We'd stayed in several KOA cabins like this, ...
	... but we really liked the way this one was laid out.
	It had been a long day, and we relaxed and celebrated with cocktails made with the delicious peach Frescas that we'd bought a few days before in Las Vegas.
	We sat together at the large table in the cabin with the windows open and played on our laptops until we went to bed. Day 20 >