Day 17, September 25, 2021

After spending the previous two days in the Arches and Canyonlands national parks, with many hours of hiking and exploring, today we planned to relax a little before moving on tomorrow to the Capitol Reef and Bryce Canyon national parks, south and west of here.

It didn’t turn out that way.

We drove 30 miles outside Moab to Fisher Towers, a remote area that isn’t a state or national park, but the landscape was just as amazing as anything we’ve seen the past two days. Tall, jagged rock formations, deep canyons, spires, pinnacles and a maze of trails that presented surprises on almost every turn.

The first trail took us deep into a canyon with a narrow path along ledges that eventually dropped down onto the canyon’s floor. At times we has to just lean back and be amazed by what we were seeing.

It was not one of the primary trails and we saw no one else until we were heading out. That was when we met James and Sadie, their two children and dog. Much to our surprise, James used to be a personnel chef to a family on Scarborough’s Prouts Neck. When the family moved to Colorado, they asked him to join them, so he and his family now live in Colorado, too. This was their first visit to Fisher Towers.

Also at the Towers we watched a crew filming individuals doing technical climbing up one of the tall spires. They were part of a recovery program from addiction and the filming was to record their journey through addiction recovery.

We later took a trail up through the tall rock formations toward Titan, the tallest of them all. But we didn’t quite make it. We had wonderful views of Titan, but it was in the low 90s, there was little protection from the sun, and we realized we weren’t carrying enough water. We were satisfied to turn around and head back.

On the drive back to Moab, we followed canyon walls with the Colorado River cutting in between. With it being Saturday, there were many rafters, kayakers, and paddleboarders.

In the shade of one of the canyon walls, this is where we stopped for lunch — and a nap!

Our final stop of the day was at Mill Creek Falls, a rarity in this part of the state. This was something Steve Hill found on an internet search and we were curious to find it.

Some other images from today’s explorations:

Tomorrow is a travel day with the final destination of Bryce Canyon National Park and Capitol Reef National Park in between.