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Arch and highlands…
As written at the end of the previous article, I went to discover a natural arch, one of these natural formations that always attract me much. These, called Aspen Arch, is fairly isolated. To achieve it requires first finding your way through a maze of various tracks more or less maintained and then, about 20 miles further, to hike through virgin nature on a sometimes steep mountainside.
1. The place I left VivaLaVida for a few hours…
2. After 3 hours hijing and some pretty climbing, I discover Aspen Arch.
3. Its about 70 feet long impress!
4. Continuing her way eastward, VLC crosses beautiful highlands.
5. Lost ranch…
6. Looks like the Altiplano sometimes, here with a salty pond…
7. The track is not very marked in places…
8. In Hartsel, small highland village…
9. Another ranch, a bit further, as VLC approach the last mountain range before the great plains, laste Rocky Mountains range eastward.
10. Not far from the road, a small group Pronghorn antelope, the last species of wild antelope in North America.
11. With some patience, I let them approach.
12. VLC sometimes serves me as a blind! 😉
13. Only a few miles further, a new unexpected meet: a beautiful deer that VLV hardly scares.
14. And a small band of burro, wild donkeys.
15. That day, they were more fearful than the deer, I couldn’t approach that much!
Continuation and end of my crossing of Colorado in a few days…
Still in Beef Basin…
1. It begins with a blurry picture! 😉 Just to show that it was chilly that morning…
While I was getting ready to break camp, I noticed a young stag who seemed a little nervous. I decided to approach it to try to photograph it.
 
2. After 15 minutes of approach, I crouched beneath a juniper not far.
3. Forty minutes later, as I tell myself I’m gonna go back to VivaLaVida, I saw a large male tumbling.
4. In fact, he was folloing a female as it’s the full rutting season. And the female had the good idea to walk fifteen feet in front of me without seeing me!
5. What an animal and what a meet… I’ll even get to see a mating the next day, about thirty feet away.
6. VLV have now to drive the trail back…
7. Nice wheel up… 😀
8. … And quite steep downhill.
9. That’s where we’re coming back.
10. On the other side of the Colorado River, Orange Cliffs and Sunset Pass where we slept with Jean-Luc last Spring.
11. Still in Beef Basin, while going down a side canyon to discover a permanent spring, I saw this Indian granary on a cliff.
12. I manage to go up the cliff to show you the inside. Both ends have collapsed or have been opened.
13. A pretty lichens and fungi that can be seen on certain blocks of sandstone.
14. Having spotted a very red cliff I went to explore, I had the chance to discover on the way this beautiful Indian granary. It is not on any map and excepted archaeologists who studied the area, few people must have seen it as it is away from everything.
15. This is certainly one of the most aesthetic that I could see to date.
16. Nearby, there are several ruins of houses.
17. The cliff above have a very red layer of the same rock I saw in Fort Bottom called Chert, a kind of silex.
18. And I’m still discovering another granary also almost intact.
19. Time to leave Beef Basin but on the road, a strong antifreeze smell made me stop. A powerful jet escapes from one of the pipes of the VivaLaVida’s engine preheater!
20. Temporary repairs with duck tape and hose clamps. We need to join Moab, a almos 100 miles away…
I will succeed the next morning and replace the pipe in question, which rubbed against a piece of metal because of a broken ziptie. I take this opportunity to do some other small works and replace the heim joints of the sway bar that had taken much of play.
That’s it for my exploration of the beautiful Beef Basin, a place that is worth the trip. See you soon. 😉
Idaho (3)
Still discovering Idaho
1. Sunset from Sunset Peak, above Boise.
2. Trying to reach Deadwood Reservoir, I was one more time stopped by the snow.
3. The altitude marshes are waterlogged…
4. … and rivers overflow.
5. An osprey hunting.
6. I really like these altitude landscapes.
7. Powerfull rapids on the South Fork Salmon River. It’s the only Salmon River that originated 60% of salmons in the Columbia River.
8. The “Elk Meadow” where I spent the night.
9. Here too first flowers appear.
10. Elegance…
11. This marsh is aptly named: this evening, I saw over 50 deers at a time!
12. I try to discreetly approach…
13. … and this time achieved it more or less.
14. Later, I needed more than two hours to make hime accept me and let me take this picture!
15. The next morning, elks are still there.
16. The next day, I made a long walk in grizzly territory to hot springs.
17. By late afternoon, a small detour to the Cape Horn Lake; I train for Patagonia! 😀
18. Kayaking on the beautiful Lake Stanley.
19. VivaLaVida at camp, three yards away from the lake.
The next update will show you some of the gold rush ghost towns”. To come soon…
D5 Creation