Canyonlands National Park

I had one of my best days of my trip while I was in Moab and at Canyonlands National Park.  I got a decent start to the day because I knew I wanted to get a lot of hiking in.  It was a little overcast, so I was kind of worried that it would rain on me and ruin my day, but luckily it held off and I had an amazing day.  I started off just driving through the park just to check things out and kind of get a feel for the place and I immediately fell in love.  The colors and the landscape mixing in with the clouds and the sky will get me every time.  It is something I will never get tired of and will never cease to amaze me.  My first stop was to see the Merimac and Monitor Buttes made out of sandstone, which I spent a lot of time just looking at in awe.  From there I made another stop to an overlook of Shafer Canyon that reminded me a lot of The Grand Canyon.  It was a gorgeous day with just the right amount of sun and clouds that gave me a great backdrop for pictures.  While I was there I saw a sign for a trail I wanted to try out so I got my gear together and was ready to set off on my hike on the Neck Spring Trail.  I’ve had a bad habit the whole time I was on my trip to find the hardest trail that I knew I could make it through just to test and push myself, and today was no different.  It was one of the hardest hikes I went on, but was also the most rewarding of all.   I started out pretty determined and optimistic as I knew I had packed everything I needed and the weather wasn’t too bad yet.  I had also gotten pretty used to looking out for the cairns that marked my trail so I wasn’t too worried about losing my way either.  As I made my way further down into the canyon I realized pretty quickly how it got its name.  Everywhere you looked there was something amazing to see and it felt like my head was on a swivel most of the time just trying to take everything in.  I stopped a lot to take pictures and just appreciate where I was and just enjoy being out in nature.  I also figured out pretty quickly that no one else was hiking this trail, and that it probably didn’t get hiked a whole lot.  That in and of itself was kind of scary and kind of peaceful all at the same time.  Those damn lizards scared the crap out of me more than a few times too.  They sure make a lot of noise for being so little when they get in the bushes and brush around you.  I was just waiting for a snake to pop out and bite me.  I probably scared myself more than anything else, just wandering if something was gonna get me.   Probably a little over half way through my hike it started to get pretty warm out, and it only gets magnified when you’re down in the canyon.  I was getting a little worn out, but I kept pushing on and made sure I stopped to eat something and to take a break.  I finally got to a point in my hike where I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do.  The only place for me to go was kind of straight up a little cliff and it took me awhile to see the cairns marking that as the right path.  I stood there for a minute trying to decide if I wanted to do it or turn back, but in the end I decided to suck it up and just go for it.  It was a little scary to do but I made it up and was very glad I didn’t fall, or I would’ve been in quite a bit of trouble.  Once I got to the top, I had my freak out moment of the day…….I looked around and couldn’t find any cairns anywhere and I didn’t see any footprints in the dirt.  It is pretty hard when there are little rocks all around you to decipher what is a trail marker and what is just a pile of rocks sometimes.  I took off in one direction hoping that I would come upon some cairns or footprints, but I found out pretty quickly that I was headed in the wrong direction.  I started to panic a little bit because I thought maybe some asshole thought it was funny to make a pile of rocks that looked like a marker and I followed it up the wrong path.  I also knew that there was a very slim chance of me crawling back down that little cliff without me falling off and hurting myself.  I calmed myself down the best I could and started looking around again and finally found some cairns a little ways up the path from where I was.  Even after I started along that path and could regularly see the trail markers it took me a little while to feel like I was going the right way.  I started to see some footprints in the dirt so that helped reassure me some more but I was still kind of freaking out a little bit.  I finally reached a point in the hike where I knew where I was……I was standing on top of part of the canyon I had once been looking up at.  In that moment I had probably one of the best feelings of my life even though it only lasted a brief time.  It seemed like everything just fell away and I had a small moment of clarity.  I felt like a badass and was so proud of myself for going on this trip and making it out of that canyon on my own.  I felt like I was on top of the world and could do anything and be anything.  I just thought of all the things that had gone on in my life the past couple of years and couldn’t even recognize the person I was a year ago, not even the person I was when I left on this trip.   I just stood there and took in all the different colors and smells that were all around me and it made me realize how small we all really are and the true beauty of nature and this world.  It was definitely a humbling experience and I felt like a little bit of my soul was healed in that moment.  It’s not very often that I feel that way and I think it is few and far between that any of us get to experience such clarity in our lives, but that is something I will hold onto forever.  Even thinking about it now brings tears to my eyes and overwhelms me with emotion.  It still took me a little while to finish up my hike but I happily made my way through the rest of the trail.  After that I drove to couple of more outlooks and took a few short hikes and saw some amazing things, but nothing that day could top my first hike.  I ended my day with some great barbeque, a crown and coke and a beautiful sunset.  Absolutely a great day in my book =)