Deadman Spring Trail

Good morning, my friends. We had quite a ride yesterday. We took our Jeep Wrangler Rubicon to the limits of its capabilities and, happily, not beyond. Just think of us as two septuagenarians out for a Sunday drive. 

When we left the campground, Sadie was enjoying the morning sunshine from the table. (Kitties are not generally allowed on the table. In this small space, we signal the OK by putting a quilt out for their snoopervising comfort.)

Just before taking off I noticed a row of about half a dozen red ant hills near our Starlink antenna. (It's sitting on the ground here because of the trees overhead. The trees have given us some nice shade in Moab, where it is very warm.) As for the ants, I could see here that these are a kind of harvester ant. Often, the ants husk the seeds they collect, carry the husk outside and deposit them in a pile outside the mound. You can see some of them around the perimeter of the hole. You can find more information about harvester ants right here.

Okay, but enough of this...let's get going. We drove out the same road as the day before, turning right at Dubinky Well Road. We chuckled a little at that name, "Dubinky," but then remembered we'd seen it on a previous trip. You can read more about it at this link. It's another gift left behind by the Civilian Conservation Corps. We left the paved road and then drove about 8 miles to the Deadman Spring Trail.

We're following along from a book of 4-wheel drive trails written by Charles A. Wells. 

Whenever we're doing off-road travel, we're using one of his books. He's done all the trails himself, and he's using the same vehicles we're using, and so we trust what he tells us. Also, he's created an app now so that we have GPS guidance. We were glad to have it a few times yesterday. Shafer Canyon Road from the day before was rated as "Easy." Yesterday's trail was rated as "Moderate." Well. It was plenty difficult for us. I'd hate to see what qualifies for the "Difficult" category. Mike and I have an agreement. The thing is, I feel less nervous when we're riding our ATV's. I have control of my own vehicle. I decide where I'll go and when I won't go. In the Jeep, I'm the passenger, and Mike is driving. And I trust Mike not to take us anywhere dangerous. On the other hand, we have some agreed-upon limits: nothing along the edge of a high cliff, nothing too tippy, and nobody dies. The last one is the most important. I just hate it when somebody dies, don't you?

Okay, so off we went. Eventually, we turned off the dirt road onto a rougher gravel road.

Our drive on Shafer Canyon Road was mainly about the scenery. Yesterday's drive was mainly about the drive, and testing the limits of our Jeep. We've owned this Jeep since it was new in 2007, and we've never really done any off-roading in it. Mike spent quite some time this past summer making sure everything was in good working order before we left home, and we have good tires on it. 

And all of that to say that I don't have a lot of scenic pictures to show you, but I have a few. Here, I marveled at how interesting the landscape is. It's flat and green all around, but then occasionally some big monument like the one below pops up. Why? Clearly, it's harder than anything else around, and it has eroded to look like this. Still, it has me asking...what happened back epochs ago to create this structure? (I might have missed my calling as a geologist.)

Here, the dirt turned more to soft sand. And here's another interesting structure. It kind of looks like that top blob landed right on top of the platform below. If one had a spatula big enough, one might be able to separate the two.

At times, we crossed large areas of "slickrock." When that happened we had to scout around to find where the road led off.

The slickrock looks like this. The ripples appear to have been created by water, but with Arches National Park nearby, wind could also have caused this.

Here, I had to get out and navigate Mike between those two big rocks. There was only a few inches of clearance on each side.

We were happy to get past that and on our way again. We came to another treacherous spot a little way farther. I got out of the Jeep and took a little video. The video is about 45 seconds long. Believe me, traveling this terrain is much more exciting when you're inside the Jeep than it appears in this video. If you can't see the video, then click right here.

We took this road out to a spot where we needed to get out and walk a little bit.

It was pretty back there with a nice juniper for shade.

We walked just a short distance to where we could see the trail namesake. During a wetter season, there would be a little waterfall there where I've indicated with a red arrow. It was dry yesterday. Our book told us to prepare to be disappointed.

Moving on, I liked these formations.

There were rock cairns in some areas, indicating where the road went. They were also mentioned in our book.

I took this next picture to document the large Juniper growing at the top of that formation, seemingly out of solid rock.

Here's a map of the trail. You can see where we started at the bottom of the page. We drove the entire trail, but there was a spur trail at Waypoint 05. There, one could go out and view the "Secret Spire." However, this is one of the areas that is now closed off to off-road vehicles. We couldn't go out to see it yesterday, but we've taken a different ATV trail in to see it on a previous trip. You can see the Secret Spire and read more about that day of riding at this link.

Continuing on, we were following the cairns here.

Below was the one spot where we got a little lost. You can see white blazes painted on the rocky wash there ahead of the Jeep. This was a little tricky getting over these shelves of rock. We followed the curves of the blazes up the other side. It was very soft sand there, and the one place where our wheels slipped a little. We should have followed the arrow to the left after leaving the wash, but instead, we zigged where we should have zagged. It took us a short time to figure out where we went wrong. Without a book, a map, and an app, it would be easy to get lost out here.

We were nearing the end of the trail by then and eventually were on the dirt road we came in on.

We stopped on the way out for this picture. See those dome-shaped structures at the top with the white caps? That's the sort of thing one will see on a visit to Capitol Reef National Park.

And let me just say that after yesterday's ride, we realized we need to let someone know where we are. From here on, we'll text our son, Erik, with the trail we're on, and then text again when we're safely back at the camper. We were never truly fearful of getting lost yesterday, but we did consider what would happen if one got lost...or lost one's navigation...or somehow ended up stuck out there. Someone needs to know where to start looking if we don't report back at the end of the day.

When we got back to the camper, it was obvious Smitty was bored half to death. Usually, it takes some coaxing to get him into his harness. On this day, he was all about it. He always has to fortify himself with a good scratch on his scratching pads. One must have one's murder mittens ready for deployment when venturing out into the cold (or hot) cruel world. When I had him outside, I set him on the RV step, and he hopped off without any hesitation. So brave.

He took a good look around, then he flopped around for a dust bath. He found the selection of grass here in Mewtah very disappointing. It's not a legal state, and so I don't suppose we should be surprised by this.

For her part, Sadie was 'zhausted after a day of snoopervising. She put out the do not disturb sign.

There are two traditions in which we engage when we come to Moab. One is to have lunch or dinner at the Moab Brewery. We checked that off our "Traditions To Uphold" list last night with dinner at the Moab Brewery.

Upholding a tradition within a tradition, I had a margarita. These used to be served in a mug. They were called a "Mug-a-rita." I have a souvenir mug at home. Last night's was served like this.

A second tradition we must uphold is to have breakfast at the Jailhouse Cafe. Driving back into Moab yesterday, we stopped at a light where I caught this picture of it. There's a story behind the building and the name.  

Here's a better picture of it:

So that's where we're headed this morning. We must uphold tradition for the sake of all humanity, and we take our responsibility very seriously. You're welcome. 

We're taking a little vacation from our vacation today. After breakfast, we'll stop off at the grocery store to pick up a few items. We'll also do a load of laundry. When all of that is finished...relaxation. I'm hoping to get started on my slow-stitching project. I've not stitched a single stitch since before we left home, and my hands are getting itchy. I'm hoping I'll have something to show you for tomorrow's post.