Spring Break 2014: Moab Trails Getaway and Bull Run

Such a great loop! We'd just ridden this loop last fall, but we like it so well that everyone was up for doing again this year. Here's the Garmin link. Getaway and Bull Run are a couple of the newer Moab trails; singletrack trails built for bicyles -- unlike many of the traditional Moab trails which were originally jeep roads (original on a 21st Century human time-scale anyway).

As noted in the previous post, we'd gone to H&C's house in GJ to escape the weather the night of the previous night (30 April). In the morning, we packed up and headed straight to the trailhead. This was actually a mistake, as I'll described later -- we probably should have gone in search of a campsite before setting off on our ride.

As we did last fall, we came in from the west and parked in the Gemini Bridges parking area. We ate lunch on the tailgate while we got the bicycles ready. We watched a big family with noisy and smelly motocross motorcycles pull in, walk down to the bridges, and then go tearing off down the road. We had to cover our ears. I'm sure it's fun, and maybe someday if my knee becomes completely useless I might enjoy a motorcycle tour, but for now, I'm glad to be on mountain bike.

Poor Amos had to sit this one out. He had a great run with us the day before at Western Rim, and he did really well off leash, but that night we notices that we was limping and we found one of his pads had been badly skinned; torn down to the pink flesh below. It took him three days to recover. So while we rode, we left the windows open in the truck and Amos just relaxed on his blanket on the back seat.

It's just a short shot down the road from the Gemini Bridges parking area to the trailhead and the you're on Getaway. We had to take a pee break shortly after starting up the trail, and when I turned around, there on the horizon were the La Sal Mountains. I just Googled them, and learned that the tallest reaches 12,721 ft above sea level.

Near the upper end of Getaway, we took a lengthy snack break and made time for a little silliness. We knew we would soon have a good mile of climbing on a gravel road to get to the top of Bull Run. We were all looking forward to riding down Bull Run along the edge of Bull Canyon, but none of us was really looking forward the next mile.

Bull Run is really fun. It's mostly downhill, and is very rocky, with quite a few challenging sections. Lot's of drops, and shelves, and slabs, but all of it -- well, nearly all of it -- quite rideable. There are just a few places where the trail gets frighteningly close to the edge of cliff. Fortunately, the cliffs in this area are not usually straight vertical edges, but have slopes and shelves that would served to slow one's fall. Of course, you can't always tell what's below them as you approach them. In the photo below, Abbey has made the wise choice to walk her bike down a ledge, around a tree, next to the cliff, and up a slab. It's good to see that someone has some sense. I think she's getting tired, too.

We saw quite a few small lizards on this ride, but none of other herpetofauna known to be common in and around Moab seemed to be out. We saw a few other cyclists on the ride, but probably not more than eight or ten.

After the ride, we started the long process of looking for a campground. After at least two hours of driving around looking at full campgrounds, we decided it was a futile search so we found a hotel. I guess we weren't the only ones who decided to go to Moab for spring break. And since we couldn't cook our planned campsite meal, we ended the day with a short walk down the road to Paradox Pizza... so good after such a long day.

Spring Break 2014: Western Rim

On a scale relevant to the 21st century human, time is precious. It's hard to find time to break out of the daily, time to get outside, time to think, time to get away, time to see time on a different scale. So, having met up with our GJ relatives for the first weekend of spring break, we traveled out to the Western Rim where it seemed that we could see the expanse of time.

The weather was a little sketchy. Cool and cloudy with a suggestion of rain. We were expecting high winds, but they held off until after the ride.

This piece of geologic history is just south of I-70 about a mile this side of the Utah border. It's an incredible place and an incredible ride. Here's the link to the Garmin log. I'd been afraid the full length of the lariat loop would be too much for us since we hadn't ridden much yet this spring, but having a pair of four-wheel drives, we drove in to the McDonald Creek Trailhead to cut off a few miles of dusty four-wheel-drive road. The trail winds through the desert scrub for a couple of miles, crossing into Utah before reaching the West Rim where it skirts along, usually not too close to the top of the rim overlooking the Colorado River.

The four of us comprising scaq took our single bikes -- our Santa Cruz fleet -- while Heather rode her Trek, and Chris and Cailan rode the Ventana tandem. The dogs, Utah and Amos, came along, too. It was a good ride, but we were feeling pretty beat by the time we hit the road for those return miles to the truck.

Later that day, the wind really picked up. We had planned to head on over to Moab and find a campsite, but the wind from the west was so strong that our poor Nissan could hardly get us down the highway. Then we heard from Heather that the power was out in at least some portion of Moab, and it was raining heavily, so we turned around headed back to GJ for the night. It's good to have options!