Saturday, May, 9.

A nice warm day in the valley but a little cool in the high mountains.

We left around noon to go to revisit the Onion Creek Trail.
On the way we took a ride up a short road to Fisher Towers. We had gotten some pictures of them from a distance but we wanted to see what they were like close up. As it turns out they are a Mecca for rock climbers.

After that we headed for Onion Creek.
The last time we were there we took a lot of pictures so this time we only took a few.

The Onion Creek trail connects with another one called The Thompson Canyon trail so we continued on. The trail goes into a very nice high valley with a ranch in the middle of it. Just before you get to the ranch the trail turns east and up a steep hill and on the other side is an even steeper decent (low range 2nd gear) The trail is very narrow and very rocky.
There are some nice views to the north from here.


There are also some nice wildflowers along the road.
Indian Paintbrush,

Scarlet Pimpernel,

what appear to be small Daisies

And others that I don’t know the names of.






As we climbed higher into the La Sal Mountains we were treated to more grand vista’s



This is a view from the ridge to the south of the ranch that I mentioned.
On the right end of the out crop of reddish rock in the middle of the valley you can see a short vertical line. That is the trail that we went over.

These next shots were taken from an 8900ft peak where there was a radio tower.



It was pretty cold up there. When we started to leave Clifford refused to start.
Fortunately we were on a 8900 ft hill. I figured that we could coast clear to highway 128 from here. I put the clutch in and rolled backward while I turned the wheel so the rear of the jeep went up a ways. It wasn’t quite enough so I had to use the starter with Clifford in 2nd gear to get us headed down the hill. We rolled just a short distance when I let the clutch out and Clifford started. I don’t know what the trouble was but it started several times after that with no problem. I don’t think a fuel injection motor will flood but that is what it seemed like to me.
Here is the last picture. It was taken from around 7400 ft looking NW.

We stopped at the Moab Diner for supper it was good.

If any of you ever get to this area and want to play in the back country I would highly recommend that you pick up the “Guide to Moab Backroads & 4-Wheel Drive Trails” by Charles A. Wells. It is easy to use and is full of valuable information.
The trails are broken into 3 categories ; Easy, Moderate and Difficult and each category is defined.
There are good maps and descriptions of each trail with waypoints, mileages and GPS coordinates for each one. There are also nice color pictures of features along the trails.
We got ours in the store at the RV Park where we are staying but they are also available on line at;
http://www.funtreks.com
He has several versions and even ones for ATV trails.