Gold and Beautiful

On Day 4 we woke up at 4:00 am and were at Canyonlands National Park to take sunrise pictures by 5:45 am. Canyonlands national park is vast and Mesa arch in the park is a perfect place to take sunrise pictures. There were a few photographers there, but the arch is not huge and the place is quite small. As our canyoneering tour guide had told us most of the times you have to fight for your spot. Luckily we didn't have to do that. But it was extremely cold and the sun took it's own sweet time to rise. We were there for an hour and were freezing. We should have probably waited longer to take more shots, but it was impossible to stand there or move around to take pictures from different angles, in spite of dressing in warm clothes. The arch glows a nice shade of red in the sunlight.  That was the last arch we saw. People had told us that we would be arched out by the end of the trip, especially since we were spending so many days in one place. But we were not!! We loved every

On the morning of Day 3 we were back to Arches National Park for more hiking. We decided to cover the northern part of the park called Devil's Garden. Devil's garden trail is the longest of the maintained trails in the park and leads to quite a few arches. The hike to Landscape arch is pretty easy and it is a 2 mile hike (roundtrip). Landscape arch is the longest arch in the park and second longest in the world. The hike to Double O arch on the other hand is 4 miles roundtrip and pretty strenuous with many short elevation changes and rocky footing. As you climb the rocks, the views around are very pretty... if you like heights. This hike is a no-no for people who are afraid of heights. The hike and the final view from the arch are definitely worth a try. In the evening we decided to cover the Windows section to get some sunset shots. The Double arch is close to the Windows section and the hike is very short. The Windows section has 3 arches, the

We booked a canyoneering trip with Moab Adventure Center for day 2. We were at their office bright and early (7 am) and were driven to Negro Bill Canyon. There we hiked for about 30 minutes and reached a grotto.  This is where we tied ourselves to a rope and rappelled down a cliff 90 ft.high. Once we got out of the grotto the next rappel was at Morning Glory arch, from a 120 ft tall cliff. From here we hiked another 2.5 miles through the canyon before heading back. That evening we decided to go to Dead Horse Point State Park to take some sunset pictures. No hiking was involved!!! Interestingly this place is called Dead Horse Point because it was used by cowboys as a natural corral and when the corral was abandoned, the horses did not leave and died. The weather in Moab is typical desert weather, hot afternoons and cold nights. So bring a sweatshirt!!

The first stop in the park is Park Avenue trail. It is a 2 mile (roundtrip, not a loop) hike through tall rocks that resemble a city skyline, hence the name. You can also have someone pick you up at the other end of the trail if you don't want to hike 2 miles. If you don't want to hike, beautiful views of the park avenue rocks are also visible from the Courthouse Towers viewpoint, which was our next stop.  The Balanced Rock was our next stop. You can walk all around the rock at the bottom and get a sense of how huge it is and wonder how it is still up there. All the time that I was there I kept thinking that one day it's going to fall and hopefully it won't be during the day time. While on one side you can see all these rocks as you go in the park, on the other side you can also see beautiful snow-capped mountains. The next stop is Fiery Furnace viewpoint, which was rather disappointing. I had seen some really nice pictures of fiery furnac

I always prefer to get done with the final exams earlier in the week, finish grading and assessments and then take a break. So I was definitely disappointed when I found out that all three of my final exams were scheduled on the 7th and the 8th. Classes ended on the 30th, I presented two projects at the STEM symposium on the 1st and would have had to wait until 7th for finals, grading and assessments. So at the last minute S and I decided to make use of this time and flew to Moab, Utah.  We spent 3 days at Arches National Park and couldn't be happier. We wanted to go to Arches during Spring break, but the weather was too cold in March. We could have waited for the semester to end and then gone, but then the temperature would have been extremely high. So, April would have been an ideal month to visit Moab, but I couldn't cancel classes in April and flying to south west cannot be (or rather should not be) done over a  2 day weekend. There is so much to do.... for anyone w