A very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from Tucson, Arizona. This photo, taken near Sedona, proves we do have winter in our glorious State…just not in Tucson.
I am spending part of my holiday with my son and his wife in Yuma. And yes, I will be wearing shorts on Christmas Day.
I will be back with you with more travel stories and photographs after the holidays.
Please enjoy this very special time of the year.
J.R. Corkrum
Here are a few more images from Capital Reef National Park. As I mentioned here previously, this under-visited park is definitely worth a drop by if you are in Southwestern Utah. They don’t even charge you an entrance fee.
All three of these images were taken along Highway 24, the main east-west artery that passes through the park.
The first photo is Chimney Rock, taken at sunset, which accounts for the amazing colors. Chimney Rock lies at the west end of the park is one of many great viewpoints available to you in this part of the park.
The second photo is further into the park, where Highway 24 enters a very narrow canyon, just past the Fruita area. I like this photo very much.
The third photo shows a small waterfall along the Fremont River that parallels the highway. You have to hike down through some rather thick underbrush to see it as it is not visible from the road. No big deal. At this point, the cliffs tower above you at least 2,000 feet. It is quite spectacular to see and nearly impossible to capture photographically.
There is one more stop on my latest Southwestern journey, before I head off to visit family and friends and to photograph a wedding…and that place has the enticing name of, Valley of the Goblins. Stay tuned…
As mentioned previously, there are two side roads off of the Scenic Drive in Capital Reef National Park. The first, only a couple of miles down the road from the campground, is the entrance the what is known as the Grand Wash.
A wash in the Southwest means only one thing…a place where water flows during a rain storm, or worse, during a flash flood. If there are dark clouds in the sky, believe me, you don’t want to be in a wash. And you are warned of that by a sign as you enter the Grand Wash.
This wash starts out as a narrow canyon between the high cliffs, then gets even more narrow. You are surrounded by high walls, and if it starts to rain, you have no where to go but up…maybe.
The road into Grand Wash is unpaved and ends after just a couple of miles. At road’s end, you can park, then easily hike further up the wash. From here, you start to see immediately what flash floods can do to change the shape of the landscape. There are holes and small caves everywhere, eroded away by flood waters, most noticeably at the bottom of the wash. You can look up and see holes higher up, so you know just how high the flood waters can flow. It was quite a bit above my head, for sure.
These kind of geological changes happen over a long period of time and take many, many floods. And while I would not want to be in here when it was raining, it sure makes for an interesting hike on a sunny day and some strange looking photographs. 
Like I said, stay out of any wash when it looks like rain. Flash floods can occur in less than a minute, even if it is not raining exactly where you are. Even though I have only lived in the Southwest for one year, I have seen torrential rains heavy enough to fill up a wash in just a few minutes.
I have a few more photographs and stories to tell you from Capital Reef, so stay tuned.
It is magnificent red rock country with other colors thrown in for good measure. Some areas below the cliffs remind me of the Painted Desert and the Painted Hills of Oregon with all their various colors, but they are easily dwarfed by the huge cliffs that rise above them.
It’s a wonderful drive with each mile unfolding a different view. Along the way, you run into unpaved roads…one leading into the Grand Wash, the other, at the end of the road, into Capital Gorge. Both drives are worth doing and I will have images from them in the near future.
Along the way, you pass hundreds of huge boulders that crashed down from the cliffs sometime in the distant past. There are also trees and colorful wild plants along the roadside.
I stopped many times along the way to photograph. Sorry that I can only show you three photos here. Eventually, many more will appear on my Web site.
Enjoy what I can show you here and stay tuned for more.
When you descend the last few miles on Highway 12, you come back into Red Rock Country, but a different kind of Red Rock than what you saw earlier along the highway. These are tall mountains and cliffs of white and deep red rock in all kinds of shapes, sizes and formations.
Highway 12 ends in Torrey, UT. Turn right onto Highway 24 and head east for 10 miles along side these tall cliffs, and you come to the boundary of Capitol Reef National Park.
This is one of the newer parks in the system. FDR signed legislation making it a National Monument in 1937. It became a National Park in 1971. The park itself runs north to south for about 75 miles, wider in the north, then becoming gradually thinner as you head south. The park gets its name from a huge up-thrust of land called the Waterpocket Fold, similar in appearance to an ocean reef.
Much of the park is inaccessible by road, although there are some some unpaved roads in both the north and south that can take you to some beautiful, remote places. The only paved roads are Highway 24 which runs east to west, meaning you can traverse the park in a very short time…and a 10 mile paved scenic road that runs from the visitor center along some of the beautiful rock cliffs and other geological wonders…with two side roads that take you into the narrow Grand Wash and Capitol Gorge.
Coming into the park, you pass through some interesting sites including Chimney Rock and The Cathedral (photo #1). When you arrive at the visitor center, you are also entering the historical district of Fruita. This was a Mormon farming community founded in the 1880’s that had a large number of fruit orchards. In fact, they are still there, still tended and continue to bear fruit. Park visitors can go into the orchards and eat all the fruit they want for free…or bag it and only pay $1 per bag.
Fruita is a very serene, lovely
place to walk around…beautiful trees of all kinds nestled up against red cliffs. Wild animals such as deer also wander free, unafraid of humans.
Fruita is also the site of a 53-site campground in one of the most beautiful settings you can image…tall oak trees give you shade during the day. Fortunately, I arrived there at the right time of day between the time folks leave and new ones arrive. I camped there for four days, and the campground was filled each night…about 80% of which were RV’s. Like most of my trip, I had beautiful weather during the day, and moderate nights.
I spent a fair amount of time exploring the gorges and washes in the park, but must admit, I took few of the dirt roads to the far off wilderness sites. But, I will share more of the pictures from the areas I did explore in the next couple of blogs.
Stay tuned.
After my trip into Long Canyon and the Burr Trail, I headed back to Highway 12. At this point, the highway is heading more north than east. After leaving the township of Boulder, the highway starts climbing into the mountains.
Up and up the road goes, eventually reaching 9,500 feet. The views are wonderful all along the way. At this point, it is no longer red rock country…it is pure mountain scenery.
As the road headed higher, I began seeing seeing large groves of Aspens. The higher I went, the more Aspens I saw…soon it was almost all Aspens. This was a nice surprise. In my travels, I am used to seeing small groves of Aspens here and there…but, up here I was seeing miles and miles of these beautiful trees. And, the higher I went, the bigger the trees became. These are very old groves.
Even though it was mid-September, at these elevations the Aspen leaves were just beginning to turn into their autumn colors…not everywhere, but it was starting. I spent about an hour wandering through these groves, enjoying the view and the clean cool air.
After reaching the summit, the road starts descending down the mountain. Still more beautiful views. At the small town of Torrey (elevation 6,800 feet), Highway 12 comes to an end, and I was back in red rock country.
For me Highway 12 was a joy to travel from beginning to end. It indeed lived up to its reputation as the most beautiful highway in all of Utah. Definitely recommended if you want to see some beautiful and diverse country. Bring your cameras.
After arriving in Torrey, I headed east again. Driving only a mere 10 miles, I arrived at the boundary of Capital Reef National Park. Stay tuned.
Note: I am heading out for a few days on a photo expedition with a pro photographer friend from the Northwest. Will write more when I get back. - JRC
I had some nice comments from readers who enjoyed my photos of Long Canyon, so I decided to share a few more. These show you the diversity of rock formations in the canyon, many of which make for interesting photos.
Photo #1 shows one of several large “swiss cheese” rocks, named after the many holes that have formed from water and wind. These rocks are plentiful in the first part of the canyon. This deep red rock is called “Wingate” sandstone.
Photo #2 is of a side canyon that comes off of the main canyon. There are several of these along the seven mile length of the canyon.
Photo #3 is one of the many large alcoves that have formed over time throughout all of Southern Utah. They are quite plentiful in Zion National Park, but there were only a few of them in Long Canyon. This one, I thought, was quite spectacular.
In my next blog, I will return to Highway 12 and climb high up into the mountains, then descend into into Torrey, UT, where the highway ends. Stay tuned.
