04 Sep Road Trippin with Karma – NM to CA: Part I

Friday September 1st 

We left Taos by 10a friday for an epic two week road trip, destined for the California Redwoods for a wedding. A couple we lived with on Kauai at Olana Farm, Grayson and Elysse, had invited us to their wedding to help run the bar and join their “dapper in the woods” wedding festivities.

I planned an epic 6 day journey from Taos, NM to Mendocino Redwood Forest, CA across 1,400 miles, four states and through multiple national parks. We took all day Friday to drive across New Mexico, into southwestern Colorado through Pagosa Springs, Durango, and Cortez. It was our first time taking Hwy 64 west through Tierra Amarillo and Chama, NM — and we were thrilled with the easy landscape, little traffic and overall relaxing drive across the state.

We wound our way leisurely into Colorado, planning a lunch / brewery stop in Durango at one of our favorites, Ska Brewing. The first 4.5 hours / 200 miles went smoothly and we were right on schedule to make it to camp by dark when we left the brewery at 4:00p. We chose a small but directly west county road G out of Cortez to cut into Utah, aiming for free camping outside Bears Ears National Monument.

The landscape grew more and more dramatic as the sun set, leading us up over cliffs, along massive red walls as we closed in on camp for the first day.

Saturday September 3

We woke up early and itching to continue our scenic drive through some of the best country Utah has to offer. We were driving down Hwy 95, which wound through Glen Canyon Recreation Area before taking us to our destination for the day: Capital Reef National Park.

The drive proved better than we could have hoped for, with insane canyon, cliff, red rock and massive expanse views for 3 glorious hours through the Utah backcountry.

We had jaw-dropping views for miles and miles, crossing the mighty Colorado River and ending up deep in canyon country.

We arrived at the trailhead late morning, not ideal for the growing hot temperatures of the day, expected to exceed 100ºF. But we would not be deterred and readied ourselves with a full load of drinking water and sandwiches for a canyon and arch-overlook hike regardless of the hot temps.

We began the hike into Grand Wash Canyon, enjoying the frequent shade and epic narrow-canyon views.

We reached the end of Grand Wash and began our climb upwards to the Cassidy Arch overlook. The heat was almost immediately overwhelming in combination with the short climb’s exertion. We had to take frequent breaks in the shade to try and cool off, but carried almost continuously along the rim trail with dramatic steep overlooks to the valley below.

We finally glimpsed the first views of Cassidy Arch, and noted the trail continued for another .75 miles on top of the arch itself. With the midday heat radiating down, we felt our view of the arch was sufficient to turn around and retreat to the shady bottom of the Grand Wash Canyon once again.

We stopped in the Narrows on the way back to eat our sandwiches and recharge before reaching the hot hot van. The short drive out of the park was hot enough to warrant a stop in the nearby, cute town of Torrey, where the Saturday evening farmer’s market was in full swing. We perused the stalls, landing on splitting a cup of peach ice cream and picking up some raw goats’ milk cheese from what turned out to be the founder of the farmers market.

Once the heat of the day had passed, we drove just outside of town to a free camping area with amazing views of the remaining rock walls.

We lounged around our van, photographed the cliffs at sunset, and enjoyed the perfect night breeze under the half moon-lit sky.