June 2, 2010
Day 35: Green River to Dead Horse Point State Park
The morning dawned overcast, humid, 65F. Not typical for Utah, but most of Utah isn't surrounded by a large expanse of irrigated grass and trees. On the east end of town I crossed the Green river, then just before merging with I-70 I turned left on old US 50 which is signed as a frontage road. It's not really a frontage road because most of it is quite far from I-70. But it does parallel I-70 for 11 mostly uphill miles on extremely bad neglected pavement. I saw only one other vehicle.
Then the old road merges into I-70 where I must pedal 6 uphill miles east to the US 191 exit. I was delighted to see a store at the US 191 exit, in the middle of nowhere.
After a rest stop I turned south on US 191 toward Moab. It's mostly downhill, but not a pleasant road. It has a narrow shoulder and heavy traffic. Many large trucks and motor homes whizzing by. The most unpleasant road of the entire trip. I had a short conversation with a Dutch couple traveling north. They were happy to learn that the rest of Utah has far less traffic.
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The La Sal mountains are ahead of me to the left, looking gradually better as the day goes on. Overall the scenery along US 191 is very bland, following a mile-wide shallow dry wash down to the Colorado river.
10 miles from Moab I stopped at another unexpected store near the highway 313 turnoff to Dead Horse Point and Canyonlands. Two stores along today's route when I expected none!
The scenery is more interesting after I turned south onto highway 313, beginning a long climb to the Colorado Plateau. Interestingly the road has a wide paved shoulder that is signed as a bike lane.
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The road climbs eventually into junipers, and at 6100 feet elevation I turned towards Dead Horse Point State Park. Past the campground full sign. I was thinking to myself they must have a hiker/biker site if they spent a fortune building a bike lane for 20 miles. I paid the $2 entry fee at 5PM and continued to the overlook at the end of the road. Dead Horse Point is a popular overlook 2000 feet above the Colorado river. It has the most spectacular view of the Colorado river in the Moab/Canyonlands area.
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After a long stop at the overlook area I backtracked 1.5 miles to the campground. It was full and there is no hiker/biker site. It took me a couple tries to find an RVer willing to let me camp on their unused tent pad.
Today was a long day, and once again the sand flies were terrible most of the time. The evening was surprisingly warm for 5900 feet elevation. It doesn't seem any cooler on the plateau than in the valley.
Dead Horse Point state park has deluxe facilities-flush toilets and sinks that use trucked in water. I'm told they use 1 to 2 tanker trucks of water per day. It's my only source of water up here on the Colorado Plateau.
Distance: 69.4 mi. (111 km)
Climbing: 3390 ft. (1027 m)
Average Speed: 10.2 mph (16.3 km/h)
Maximum Speed: 31.5 mph (50.4 km/h)
Today's ride: 69 miles (111 km)
Total: 1,604 miles (2,581 km)
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