IntrepidXJ's Adventure Blog

Arizona Strip & Southern Utah Wanderings | Day 7
Friday, October 12, 2012

Sometime after midnight the skies finally opened up and it started raining. There was a little lightning and thunder, too. It would rain harder and softer but remained pretty constant for the rest of the night. Around the time we wanted to get up in the morning it started to rain the hardest yet, with a few close lighting strikes. We waited in our dry tents for the storm to let up so that we could finally get outside.

When the rain finally stopped for a short time I got out of my tent and snapped this photo. There was a small wash next to our tents that was flowing pretty good. We were high enough that it didn’t affect us.

Wet Camp by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Shortly after we got out of our tents, this rainbow appeared across the desert.

Desert Rainbow by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Our original plan for the day was to hike the Slickhorn Canyon #1 and #2 loop, but I wasn’t up for hiking the loop in the pouring rain and neither was Jared. We could see more storms approaching, so we decided to drive over to the top of the Moki Dugway so I could get some cell signal and check the weather forecast.

While driving back to the highway we spotted a small double rainbow in the distance.

Rainbows & Jeep by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr
 

Arizona Strip & Southern Utah Wanderings | Day 6
Thursday, October 11, 2012

After sleeping in a little later on Thursday morning, we had a little breakfast and hiked down the old road past the washout in search of rock art. After looking at the washout closely, I’m pretty sure I could have driven my Jeep across if I really wanted to, but we were more interested in hiking today, so that’s what we did. We managed to find plenty of petroglyphs on the scattered boulders along the way, some were better that others, but they were all fun to discover as we hiked.

This large boulder had a few footprints pecked into the top of it like tracks.

Footprints by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

This was one of the better petroglyph panels we found.

Hands by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Two atlatls and another duckheaded man.

Atlatl Boulder by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr
 

Arizona Strip & Southern Utah Wanderings | Day 5
Wednesday, October 10, 2012

On Wednesday morning, after a great night sleeping under the stars on Alstrom Point, we woke up just as dawn was starting to break. I rolled out of my sleeping bag, grabbed my camera and walked a few feet to the edge of the cliff overlooking Lake Powell. Looking towards the sky to the east I had a feeling that there was going to be a great sunrise.

My campsite for the night as the sky begins to light up. I’ve had a lot of questions about my tentcot in the past, and another great feature of it is that I can use it as just a regular cot, too.

Morning View by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Lake Powell and the cliffs in the distance as the sky above turns pink.

Warm & Cool by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Right before the sun came up, the sky exploded with color! One of the best sunrises I have witnessed.

Alstrom Point Sunrise by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr
 

Arizona Strip & Southern Utah Wanderings | Day 4
Tuesday, October 9, 2012

Since there weren’t really any good places nearby to photograph sunrise, we slept in a little later on Tuesday morning. After a little breakfast we packed up camp and took the rough Jeep road to it’s end where we would start our hike. Our destination for today would be to the top of Flag Point in the Vermilion Cliffs of the Grand Staircase. Jared and I had wanted to try this hike last year, but were unable to squeeze it in. From what I understand, most people that have made this trek hike up from the base of the cliff and are able to find a way up, however we thought that we would try to hike from the backside. It was probably a longer hike, but it involved less steep climbing.

The view towards Kanab from the top of Flag Point.

Flag Point View by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

After visiting the point we started hiking along the rim in search of a dinosaur track site.

Rim Hiking by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Jared taking a photo looking back at Flag Point.

Leaving Flag Point by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr
 

Arizona Strip & Southern Utah Wanderings | Day 3
Monday, October 8, 2012

On Monday morning we got up early and wandered over to The White Pocket again to catch the sunrise. We arrived plenty early to try and catch the pre-sunrise glow, which was amazing!

There’s sometimes an amazing glow that really brings out the colors in the sandstone about 10-20 minutes before sunrise. You can see it with your eyes, but a long exposure really brings it out in your photos.

Radiate by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

Interesting shapes and lines in this formation and nice clouds in the sky. We couldn’t have asked for better conditions.

Awake by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr

White Pocket Butte lights up with alpenglow right before the sun comes up.

White Pocket Alpenglow by IntrepidXJ, on Flickr