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Moab 2K+1: Story and Photos...
Days 1 and 2:

We started on Monday (April 30, 2001) to head towards Moab, UT for a 9-day trip (including driving). There were 5 of us going-- me, Ray, Marc in my Ford Taurus SHO; Stan and his friend Dan were in his Subaru Legacy wagon. Stan and Dan left the day before we did, and they had to return a couple days earlier than us.

The trip got off to a slow start-- Marc had a few delays in arriving at my house, so we didn't actually get to Ray's place until 11:30am or so. When we got there the wind was pretty crazy-- leaves and cherry blossoms were being blasted all over the place, and it was threatening rain. On the drive down towards the Peace Arch border crossing, the rain was *very* heavy at times. While waiting in the long lineup at the Peach Arch, the clouds above us blew past, leaving bright blue skies... there was an amazingly strong headwind, though.

Shortly after a rest stop not too far East of Seattle, we noticed that despite the lack of rain, the road was soaking wet. Sure enough, it was because we were catching up to the stormclouds that had blown past us earlier. The weather was miserable all the way through Snoqualmie pass. Minutes after getting out of the pass, we must've passed through a rainshadow area, since the ground was suddenly very dry, with dry-looking yellow grass instead of the lush green forest undercover that we'd seen through the pass.

Picture: Taken from the car, this is one of the areas not too far East of Snoqualmie Pass.

Picture: Same area, seconds later, a photo of me driving. The picture didn't come out all that well, though...

Picture: Same area, we'd passed through another rainy spot, and suddenly it became sunny again and the road was shiny-- it looked quite spectacular.

Picture: Ray driving my SHO. I can't remembrer exactly when this was. I was apprehensive of Ray taking the wheel of my car, since it's a 5-speed standard car and Ray'd only driven a standard a couple times earlier. He didn't do too badly-- shifts were a bit rough (as were the starts), but it wasn't as bad as I'd feared it would be.

Picture: These hills looked quite spectacular from the driver's seat. This picture highlights one of the problems with the dashboard material that Ford installed in this SHO-- it's shiny. In flat-light conditions there's an amazing amount of light that gets reflected off the dash.

I drove for the vast majority of the drive to Moab-- Ray and Marc (who'd never driven a standard before) didn't do too badly. They put a solid effort in and drove through the night. One moment that got my heartbeat up a bit was when Marc pulled off the highway to go to a Flying J gas station... He pulled off, a highway patrol cruiser pulls up behind us, and Marc started off with one of his not-so-smooth starts... Jerk, jerk, jerk, jerk... Fortunately, the cruiser didn't pull us over or anything...

The mountains around Salt Lake City, UT were quite spectacular. I didn't take any pictures of them, though.

Driving Southeast from Price, we passed through some areas that were straight out of a Road Runner cartoon. That, and we caught the migration of the Monarch butterflies. All over my front bumper. Monarchs splatter yellow.

Arriving in Moab, the weather was spectacular, if a little on the warm side. Temperature was in the 30s, only a few whisps of cloud in the sky... We were camped in the Salt Flats Recreational Area, right where the Slickrock trail's located. (we never rode the Slickrock, though). Stan and Dan had set themselves up in section G of the campground, because the site they found was really nice and was secluded from the noisy 4x4 people around the campsite. Driving down the little one-way road that makes up section G, I noticed that it was fairly steep, bumpy, and the sand was deep (I hadn't noticed the "4x4 recommended" sign). Yup, I slid my way down that road! (fortunately that section was short). We continued on the one-way road until we came to a precipitously-steep section with big-looking rocks. I managed to turn around and get to our campsite the other way. Word to the wise: the SHO is *not* a good car to drive on dirt roads, no matter how smooth they may look!

After we set up our camp, I decided to have a little nap in the rear passenger seat of my car; I was beat. Well, I never got a chance to sleep. As I was climbing into the back, I noticed that the rear tire was looking a little soft. I blamed the fact that it was in deep sand. ...Well, as I sat down, I realized that being in deep sand it would increase the surface area of the tire and the tire should have *less* of a bulge than it normally does. Yep, my tire was flat. I managed to drive it out the steep, sandy road that I'd slid down an hour or so ealier.

Picture: Stan and me, putting on my mini spare tire on a firm dirt road.

Picture: Stan and me, posing for the camera.

Marc and I took the car into town, found (seemingly) the only tire repair place in Moab (American Car Care Center), and brought the flat tire in to them. The guy laughed when he saw what looked to be a rock sitting in my tire. He pulled the tire off the rim, and said that we'd lucked out. $9 later, my car was driveable again. Thanks, American Car Care Centers!

The "stone" in my tire was actually a piece of glazed ceramic... Probably a piece of a broken plate or a broken mug that I'd picked up on the dirt road approaching section G of the campsite.

Picture: From the road near our campsite, you could see the beautiful sky, big red rocks, and snow-covered peaks not-so-far-away.

Picture: Ray standing in front of the big rock that bordered our campsite. Notice the moon in the sky.

Picture: Me in front of the same rock, at about the same time. (yeah, I know-- a poor scan-job...)

Continue to DAY 3!