Denver to Moab

7th April

Temp Range – -8 to 14 degC

We had been watching the weather channel all morning before taking off – Snow storm coming through and trucks were advised to put on snow chains, we checked to make sure we had snow tyres on the car. So we set off on the most dangerous drive we’ve ever done!

The weather was cold but clear as we left Denver, we were travelling find along the I-70 for about 20 minutes then it started snowing and the temp started to drop. They had already had a days worth of snow the day before that hadn’t melted as it was still below freezing.

It was fun at first, but the snow conditions worsened and the roads got worse. The roads were covered in snow and ice, the snow falling, and white snow all around you could hardly see a thing. Trucks started pulling over to put on there chains. We all slowed down to about 10 mph as it was getting very dangerous, cars were sliding all over the place, some turned back. We did a couple of uncontrolled slides but no damage, it was a 3 lane highway, but we were only using 2 lanes as we couldn’t see the markings anyway. It had dropped to -8 DegC, we had the heater pumping, so we could try and melt the ice that was forming on the windscreen…by this time I needed the toilet, but we couldn’t exit as the exits were all closed by snow and too dangerous! (Mikey did really well for his first time driving on snow/ice)

We finally found a cleared exit and so we risked a stop at the servo. We then drove through Vail (ski area) and finally the temp started to warm up and the ice on the window started to melt. ( I didn’t take any photo’s of all of this as we were concentrating so hard on the road).

We stopped at Glenwood Springs for lunch at Hungry Jacks (the $1 spicy chicken burger tasted really good, but believe me the damage it does to your relationship later in the day is worth about $100!).

Got back on the road, then some rain, then really high winds then to top it off….. tumbleweeds we finally made it to Moab!

Great little town, lots of things to see and restaurants. Checked into the hotel (La Quinta – great room)….then believe it or not, we jumped back into the car and headed back to the Arches National Park (10 minutes) to have a look $10 vehicle 7 day entry.

We had a quick look around the Info centre and then headed up the ranges. This place is amazing!!! All sealed roads and places to park to take pictures. Balanced rock then out to Delicate Arch Viewpoint, then back to the North / South Window Arches for Sunset (7.45pm), amazing scenery.

Delicate Arch Viewpoint

North Window

North Window

North and South Window at sunset

Sunset

Then we headed South to the Branding Iron Restaurant. Mikey had ribs (for the 5th night running) and I had ½ BBQ chock then back to the hotel. What an amazing day of stress and wonder!


Gallery of the drive to Moab can be found here.
Gallery of the Arches can be found here.