These two places are our all time favorites to return to time and time again. We had a long standing family tradition of spending the week of Thanksgiving in Moab for years, it was low season so prices were favorable and crowds were nonexistent. Returning here was somewhat of a homecoming, so many familiar sights and a restoration of peace in the red Utah desert.

Since we were coming from the south and didn’t want to move twice in a short span of time we opted to spend more time in the Needles district of Canyonlands NP. The highlight was the 11 mile hike we took in the Chesler Park area. We all really pushed ourselves to go this distance, surpassing our previous hiking record of about 8 miles. I’m always particularly amazed at Camden’s ability to span these distances since he still has the shortest legs. Everyone loved the challenging rock scrambling parts the most. Needles to say, we took it easy the next day with a drive into Moab for our favorite burgers at Milt’s and some custom screen printed t-shirts from the old shop on the main drag.

One of our other favorite pastimes in this area is to drive somewhere remote on a BLM road, stop at some rock outcroppings, then get out and start climbing. It’s a fantastic way to see a vantage point that likely no one has seen before. We always encourage one another and stay safe, never going too far a distance or too high that we can’t climb back down. Our next goal in Canyonlands will be to travel to the Maze district, perhaps later on this trip.