Thursday, May 24, 2007

Drive through Escalante, Boulder, to Capitol Reef - spectacular Highway 12

Even though Highway 12 has some 8 and 10 percent grades (!), we are glad we took it - wow, what beautiful scenery!! You can tell when you climb the last "step" of the Grand Staircase and then descend to the Escalante part of the monument - miles of smooth pale rock formations - like swells and waves on a stormy sea - it reminded me of the Yosemite high country, only in sandstone instead of granite. The Escalante River is the shaper of this section, as it meanders through canyons and oxbows. We crossed the Escalante in a deep, cottonwood filled canyon and climbed back up, then back down to where Calf Creek Campground is - we were tempted to stop there, but were headed to Fruita because Memorial Day weekend was approaching and we were worried about being pushed out of someplace that took reservations. We would like to go back and further explore that region someday, though!

We made a stop in the town of Escalante and visited a neat little mountain shop (Utah Canyons). They sold a book I had seen at the visitor center in Kanab, With a Measure of Grace, The Story and Recipes of a Small Town Restaurant, which is from the Hell's Backbone Grill in Boulder, Utah. I asked them about it and they said it was amazing, and some people plan their vacations around it, it is so good. Hmmmm.... it's almost lunchtime... let's go for it! So we headed from Escalante to Boulder, through more amazing scenery, and found the Hell's Backbone Grill right by the Burr Road turnoff (next to the Burr Road Grill, which is also supposed to be good, but just not amazing). It sure looked great on the outside, but sadly, it isn't open for lunch. (Moment of silence here to mourn loss of potential gourmet experience... we'll just have to come back!) We were starving by this time, and drove up to the next pullout and made lunch. It was pretty good, too! It turns out it was a really good thing the Hell's Backbone Grill wasn't open for lunch, because when we got to Capitol Reef, we got one of the very last campsites - but a little more about getting there first.

Boulder was a beautiful "town" - it's mostly an area of houses - and one of the most isolated places in the US. It was the very last town in the country to have mail delivered by truck - it was delivered by mule train up until the 40's! Its green pastoral scenes make a lovely contrast with the bare rock formations all around. After Boulder, the highway begins climbing up Boulder Mountain, abruptly leaving the slickrock and sandstone for basalt, pines, aspens and meadows! And from the viewpoints, we could look back on everywhere we'd been, and on the other side, where we were going. Capitol Reef is the eastern part of the "Circle Cliffs" and we could see it from Boulder Mountain.

At Capitol Reef, there were these rounded black boulders scattered across the red sandstone - they came from Boulder Mountain! Geologists think that it was from debris flows and as erosion has carved down the sandstone and limestone and shale, the boulders remain. Fascinating.

Capitol Reef is named that because there are light Navajo Sandstone domes that reminded people of the Capitol Building, and "reef" because it was a giant obstacle to crossing the desert, like a large reef might be to ships at sea.

Our ship ran aground at Capitol Reef and we foundered there happily for a week!



No comments: