IntrepidXJ's Adventure Blog

Today, Amanda and I headed to the Sand Flats Recreation Area just outside of Moab. Our goal was to run the Hells Revenge and Fins & Things trails. It has been a few years since I have run either of these trails, so it was about time to run them again.

I also wanted to give my new JK a good workout to see how it performs and get used to driving it. Overall, I was very happy with how the JK performed…..the electronic front sway-bar disconnect was nice 🙂 Approach and departure angles were pretty good as well. I only ended up scraping my rear receiver once, and I never scraped the front bumper or plastic air dam at all. The only thing I would like to improve is the belly clearance, especially under the gas tank, which seemed to be the spot I scraped the most. I also noticed that the stock gas tank skid is definitely not up to the task, as I managed to put a few good sized dents in it already. So I guess I will be adding a newer heavy duty gas tank skid to my list of future upgrades…

We got an early start on Hells Revenge and pretty much had the trail to ourselves.

Follow the tracks

When we reached the overlook above the Colorado River, we ran into the only group of three vehicles we would see on the trail. After checking out the overlook they were discussing the Hells Gate optional obstacle nearby and trying to decide if they wanted to try it. I was not planning on running Hells Gate since we were alone on this trip, but since they were around I offered to run it so they could decide if they wanted to try it. The JK had no problems climbing Hells Gate. Unfortunately, they still decided to skip this obstacle…..at least I got to run it 🙂

Headed towards the Black Hole

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Yesterday Amanda and I headed to Arches National Park for the sole purpose of hiking to Delicate Arch. We left home early and ended up staring the hike to the arch shortly after 9:00am. When we reached the arch, we were lucky enough to have it to ourselves for a little while. It seems that the last few times I have headed to Arches, the skies have been nice and overcast for me, and yesterday was no exception. It wasn’t until we were heading back down from the arch that the clouds finally started to clear out. Here’s some photos from our hike.

Arrived at Delicate Arch and had it to ourselves.

Me, under the arch.

Amanda and I.

Amanda next to the arch.

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This morning Amanda and I set off to do some hiking at the Colorado National Monument. Our first destination was the Liberty Cap trail. This is a trail we had not been on before. We started at the bottom and planned to head up to the Liberty Cap before heading back down, however after climbing about 500 feet on the trail, the ice and mud got too slick, so we ended up turning around.

Since we didn’t complete that trail, we decided to head over and check out Echo Canyon, since we haven’t been back there for a while.

View up No Thoroughfare Canyon

This way to Echo Canyon

We hiked about halfway6 up Echo Canyon until we stopped at a slickrock area that had water running through it and a few small waterfalls. We just sat down and relaxed here and listened to the running water. It was very relaxing.

My shadow over a pothole full of water

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February 15, 2010

My goal for President’s Day was to head out to Moab and to find some geocaches. However, there was more snow and ice around Moab than I had hoped for, which killed that idea, as I was not about to go digging in ice and snow looking for geocaches. I had started out on the Cotter Mine Road hoping to find some caches near the Monitor & Merrimac Buttes, but when I reached the turnoff, I quickly found out that it had not been traveled.

Along the Cotter Mine Road

Instead of breaking through the icy snow, I decided to loop around back to the highway and head to Arches National Park. When I arrived at the park, I made my way towards The Organ, where I parked my Jeep and started hiking up the Park Avenue trail.

Three Gossips and Baby Arch

Three Gossips

The Organ

Park Avenue

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February 13 – 14, 2010

For the weekend following my birthday, I wanted to head back to Capitol Reef National Park. When I was there back in October, I noted a couple of hikes I wanted to check out and figured this would be a good time.

After driving through some thick fog early Saturday morning, we arrived at Capitol Reef and started on our first short hike up to Hickman Bridge.

After climbing above the Fremont River looking back at Capitol Dome with the road below.

Hickman Bridge

On our way back from the Hickman Bridge, we stopped at the Nels Johnson Bridge

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