We’re still in that slot Canyon in southern Utah. Part 1 can be found here:
A Slot Canyon
A ground squirrel bounces away from us, stops and waits, unsure.
A lizard cautiously awaits our passage.
We decide to take a rest at a large rock near a bend.
Sometimes, there are too many photos of a wonderful fun place to choose from and perhaps too many for the text. Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words, as they say. This will be one of those stories.
In a perfectly lovely morning, the juniper tree blocks the direct sun on our open net topped tent. From this, we have a less abrupt wake-up call, and cool comfort pervades. After laying relaxed, looking up at the sky, encouraged by the day’s agenda, I roll into breaking camp mode. DF prepares a breakfast of chopped bananas in the delicious ground almond porridge stuff that she often brings from home.
Heading down the road that we came in on, up the eroded steep sandy hill, we find the turn off which goes to an obvious double arch off of the main road.
The turn off looks like an obscure and rough side-road, judging from the map. There is more road and open space to see out here, but we have other plans and prefer to beat the heat in the shade of some intriguing geology. We’re going to investigate an unusual form, a double natural arch.
We have just visited the popular House on Fire ruins. If you haven’t read it, I suggest going there first for context. See the story here:
The plan is to head on up the trail from the ruins and into the canyon where the crowds rarely go. There, we can look for any more signs of ancient life and explore in natural pleasant nudity with little chance of being interrupted by others. There is always something fun and of interest in these remarkable canyons. We figure that we’ll spend another hour or so, up the trail and then return, depending on the heat and comfort.
As soon as possible, we are once again naked in the sun, but maybe within sight of those people who are above, near the ruins, hidden in the brush.
These ruins! Discovering pictographs and petroglyphs is addicting. We know that there are likely more. This area was just too rich and big to not be inhabited by more ancient farmers.
The Free Range Naturist 