Onion Creek Road

Sunday, Oct 28th, we took a short trip up Onion Creek Road. This is an easy drive near Fisher Towers. It is called Onion Creek (which you cross 20+ times) because of the chemicals in the water. Besides salt there are sulphur and arsenic so of course they recommend you wash your vehicle, especially the undercarriage, when you are through. The drive was pleasant with a lot of twists and turns. Narrow in most places and of course dirt. But the FJ Cruiser took it well. We really enjoyed the canyons and scenery.
These are known as The Chessmen. Also in this area are The Candlestick, Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf. We found the Candlestick but didn't notice the others. But with so much to look at we'll have to go back and find them.

Castle Valley Style Traffic Jam
This was an unexpected surprise. A cattle drive coming down the road. The cows were spred out for quite a ways and we slowly made our way through. At the end were the two drivers with their dogs. We also passed them again as we were coming back out. This road dead ends at bike trails and a ranch.


This is the Candlestick. We had a better shot on the way out as the sun was in a better position. We have also discovered at the beginning of this road are some great places to take shots of Fisher Towers for sunsets. We will certainly be going back for evening shots.

We then went and washed the FJ as they suggested. Not only to get the chemicals for the stream crossings off but to get the cow poop off as well. But it was certainly worth the trip.

Fisher Towers & Arches

Thurs, Oct. 25th, the moon was almost full so Rick grabbed his camera and stepped outside and shot the moonrise over the cliffs from our front yard. The moon was so bright, you could hardly see the stars that are normally brilliant.

He then got in the car and drove to Fisher Towers and took more pictures of the sunset. This is only about a 20 minute drive from our home so will probably do this frequently when we think it might be worth the shot. There are a couple of really nice places along the road to pull off for taking pictures. Some day we will actually go up to the Towers and take pictures.
Friday, Oct. 26th, it looked like we might have another great sunset, so we both grabbed camers and drove into Arches National Park. Again, this is only about a 30 minute drive from our home. The is a shot of Turret Arch taken from a pullout near the Cove of Caves.
These are the Cove of Caves. This was the first time we had ever really stopped here and taken pictures. We usually go onto the Windows area, but were glad we shot here for a change. For one thing, we were the only ones here!
Sat. afternoon, Oct 27th, after we had spent the morning cleaning the house, we decided to do some 4-wheeling. We drove back into Arches and took the road to Tower Arch. The books said it was a moderate drive for a high clearance 4-wheel drive. Since this was our first time, it was a bit of a challange (in other words Eileen scared-RW), but we enjoyed it and Tower Arch (shown left here) was worth it. We had never seen it before. The road usually can go on to Balanced Rock, but since the floods in August, the road is closed so we had to turn around and come back the way we came. Luckily, we never met anyone going either way as there were few places you could have passed another vehicle.

Pictures from Our New Home

This is our new bedroom furniture. We bought this for the new house. Our new king size air bed is really nice and we enjoy sleeping in it.
This is the TV armoir in our bedroom. We have a 32" HD LCD flat screen inside. We enjoy watching it. We also have a 52" HD LCD flat screen in the family room which we REALLY enjoy watching
View of the kitchen and eating area with the new furniture in it. We love it. Have decided to order a 3rd barstool for the counter.

Close up of the kitchen table and chairs. We have eaten at this many times now and really like it. The views are great out the windows or we can watch the 52" TV from here also.

Sunrise and Sunset Pictures From Our Property

WE'RE FINALLY HERE!

We arrived in Castle Valley Monday evening, Oct. 8th. We had planned on staying at the house that night but since the water was not hooked up we weren't able to. They tried to hook the water up but when they did, they hooked it up to the drain under the hot water heater and flooded the laundry room. After cleaning up the mess, Rick, Scott and I went to town and got a motel room for the night. We were lucky to get one as tourist season is still going on until the end of this month.

Tuesday we came out and started unloading the truck. I stayed at the house and started unpacking while Rick, Scott, and Dave (the guy who helped us in Feb.) went to the storage units and started getting things. Meanwhile the workers at the house started trying to fix things. You know, like that fact that all the sinks leaked. We had no hot water (which we didn't get until Thursday). It took Tues. and Wed. to get all the things from storage sorted through and brought to the house. We still have two units with stuff and will until the garage is done. Good news, they finally poured the garage pad on Friday!

Have discovered that in both showers the hot and cold are reversed. In fact all plumbing in the main bath is. And you get a shower every time you turn the tub on. Also, the toilet fills with hot water.

While checking out the drains on Friday, the guy was filling the large tub is the master bath and forgot about it and of course, the drain didn't work (found out it was taped off under of the house and not hooked up at all). So it flooded the all over the bathroom floor, into the laundry room and into the master bedroom under the carpet. What a disaster. And of course this was just before Cara and the girls were coming for the weekend. But we got it cleaned up and a fan blew on the carpet to dry it for days.

Scott, Cara, Allison and Madison were such a help in getting things done around here and unpacking. Don't know what we would have done without them. Hopefully their next visit will be that, a visit and we can go do some FUN things.

Rick was able to take a few photos of a sunrise and a sunset from the house which are posted above. Other than that, we haven't taken the time to go do anything. Just too busy getting the house livable and getting rid of the boxes.