{"id":12808,"date":"2020-12-02T14:35:04","date_gmt":"2020-12-02T14:35:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/usnomadstudio.com\/usnomads\/blog\/?page_id=12808"},"modified":"2020-12-02T19:40:23","modified_gmt":"2020-12-02T19:40:23","slug":"notes-from-the-road-15-21-october-2020","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/usnomadstudio.com\/usnomads\/blog\/?page_id=12808","title":{"rendered":"Notes From the Road — 15-21 October 2020"},"content":{"rendered":"
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NOTES FROM THE ROAD<\/h2>\n
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< more recent<\/a> | 15-21 October 2020 | older ><\/a><\/p>\n

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Day 25 – LON Moab Day 3…<\/h5>\n


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A day in Town …<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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21 October 2020:<\/strong> Took a break from the trails for a day in town, visiting some local shops, meeting key people, and generally enjoying a leisurely day…<\/p>\n

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Day 24 – LON Moab Day 2…<\/h5>\n


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Out to the Wind Caves …<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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20 October 2020:<\/strong> On the trail to Chicken Corners today, taking in more incredible landscapes and enjoying the twists and turns of the switchbacks. Stopped at the Wind Caves for lunch and stayed to explore and play for a while before finishing up with some optional side loops…<\/p>\n

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Day 23 – LON Moab Day 1…<\/h5>\n


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Classic red rock scenery …<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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19 October 2020:<\/strong> Eased into the week with some scenic trails today, winding our way along Potash Road and over to Gemini Bridges. A mellow paced day with some time to get out and explore on foot and make some postcard perfect pictures of classic Moab red rock landscapes…<\/p>\n

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Day 22 – Setting up Base Camp…<\/h5>\n


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Getting together with the LON group…<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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18 October 2020:<\/strong> Met up with the rest of the Ladies Offroad Network group to get set up for a week of fun on the trails to celebrate some birthdays. Established a “base camp” in the backyard at Grandpa’s Garage and got organized for an early start tomorrow…<\/p>\n

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Day 21 – Daytrip to Buckhorn Wash…<\/h5>\n


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Petroglyphs and an easy desert drive…<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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17 October 2020:<\/strong> Made a “day trip” back out to the San Rafael desert much further to the north this time to check out the Buckhorn Wash petroglyphs and do some exploring in the landscapes of the “Swell”…<\/p>\n

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Day 20 – Moab: Back to Town…<\/h5>\n


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Returning to “civilization”…<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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16 October 2020:<\/strong> Left the Needles via the Elephant Hill return leg, then headed into the town of Moab for the night. Time to resupply and reorganize for the upcoming week…<\/p>\n

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Day 19 – The Needles: Day Four…<\/h5>\n


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A final day of desert solitude…<\/strong><\/h6>\n


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15 October 2020:<\/strong> Back through the spires this morning, driving from Bobby Jo to the final campsite at New Bates Wilson, with a few stops to explore on foot along the way. Set up camp and just appreciated the beauty of desert solitude for this final night in the Needles …<\/p>\n

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PREVIOUS NOTES FROM THE ROAD<\/a> ><\/a><\/h6>\n<\/div>\n
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THIS MONTH:<\/strong>
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\nHitting the road again to begin the next big U.S.A. Roadtrip to the west. For this journey we will be spending some time en route exploring a few of the wild places in between New York and Moab. We are making the long drive west into its own overland adventure with camping, hiking and off-road fun. The focus of this trip is to appreciate America’s wilderness and get to know some of the lesser known public lands along the way…
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COMING UP SOON:<\/strong>
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\nA new Moab adventure is in the works for October, details to come soon…

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\nThe 5th Annual 2020 Ladies Offroad Challenge<\/a> started on May 4th. Ladies will participate in a series of challenge tasks that are built to educate and encourage stepping into some unknown territories. The Challenge goes on through October this year with participants striving to “Do the Best They Can” at each of the tasks. Ten Participants from the Challenge will be invited to the very special Top 10 Weekend hosted by Charlene Bower…

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\nLooking ahead to a return to Paris as soon as possible to reconnect with friends and some favorite places in the city of light. Timing is still uncertain due to the pandemic, but we hope the trip is back on the calendar for late fall\/early winter…
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BUCKHORN WASH PICTOGRAPHS <\/strong><\/p>\n

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The Buckhorn Wash panel located in a scenic sandstone canyon of the San Rafael Swell is a spectacular example of Barrier Canyon style rock art. The ghostly red figures seem to stand watch over the San Rafael River. The site includes both painted (Pictographs) and pecked (Petroglyph) prehistoric images, but the main panel, over 130-feet long, consists of a series of red pictograph figures pained over 2,000 years ago. The Barrier Canyon people were an archaic hunter-gatherer society that produced a distinctive style of rock art which appears mostly in Utah. The largest concentration of Barrier Canyon style sites are in and around the San Rafael Swell and Canyonlands National Park, but the full range extends as far as western Colorado. The red pigment was created using powdered hematite, and possibly mixed with animal fat, eggs, or some other fluid. For a brush, they may have used fingers or brushes made from animal fur or slender grasses. When painted on freshly exposed sandstone, the stone absorbs the pigments, thus preserving them for thousands of years. No one knows for sure what the images represent or why they were painted. Much speculation centers on shamanistic or religious figures. Typically, the billboard-sized galleries are not found near habitation sites but are often in very visible locations near the mouths or junctions of long canyons. Large elongated anthropomorphic figures predominate both in size and number. According to David Sucec of the BCS Project<\/a>, five general style features seem to characterize the Barrier Canyon style: 1) Large “gallery-like” rock art sites often from 90 to 300 feet in length, 2) Consistent attention given to aspects of visual form and virtuoso painting techniques, 3) life-size to heroic scale anthropomorphic figures, 4) an unusually large number of variations, variety of form-types, particularly spirit figures, within the image-inventory of the style, and 5) compositions apparently representing friendly associations of animal, bird, snake and plant images with anthropomorphic spirit figures.
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ABOUT THE NEEDLES<\/strong><\/p>\n

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The Needles forms the southeast corner of Canyonlands National Park<\/a> and was named for the colorful spires of Cedar Mesa Sandstone that dominate the area. There are hundreds of them poking up from the desert floor. There are also entrenched canyons, natural arches and sheer-walled cliffs in this vast, rugged landscape. About 50 miles of challenging backcountry roads lead to campsites, hiking trailheads, and natural features such as Tower Ruin, Confluence Overlook, Elephant Hill, the Joint Trail, and Chesler Park. One of the most technical four-wheel-drive roads in Utah, Elephant Hill presents drivers and mountain bikers with steep grades, loose rock, stair-step drops, tight turns, and tricky backing. Once over the hill, equally challenging roads lead to various features as well as BLM lands south of the park. Elephant Hill leads to a collection of parallel, vertical-walled valleys formed by rock faulting, known as the Grabens that continue to Beef Basin and the Manti-La Sal National Forest, south of the national park. Within the backcountry area of the Needles centered around Chesler Park there is quite a complex network of interconnecting paths, mostly along canyons and\/or across slickrock benches. A reminder from the National Park Service: All of these roads require high-clearance, low range four-wheel-drive vehicles. Inexperienced drivers should not attempt these roads. There is a high risk of vehicle damage, and towing costs usually exceed $1,500.<\/p>\n

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