2009 Southwest Adventure

North Rim of the Grand Canyon

July 31, 2009
Jack and I are taking off for our trip across the Southwest en route to the annual Aspen Family Business Gathering in Snowmass. Our route takes us to Marble Canyon, North Rim of the Grand Canyon, Zion National Park, Boulder Utah and the Hells Backbone Grill, Torrey, Utah and Basalt Colorado before we hit Snowmass....Join us for the latest view of our beloved Southwest USA

Highway 17 Northbound
Jack and I are heading out for our annual drive to Aspen for the Aspen Family Business Gathering conducted by my partners and myself. We explore new areas and favorite haunts along the way.

This year our route takes us past Flagstaff to Marble Canyon which is along the Colorado River and Vermillion Cliffs National Monument. We will spend the night at a fishing lodge and take off early in the morning to visit the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. From there we head to Zion National Park for a day and a half. We take route 12, one of the most beautiful roads in the US past Bryce Canyon National Park. That will take us through Grand Staircase/ Escalante National Monument to Boulder Utah, a town of 120 people and one of the best restaurants in the world (in our opinion): Hells Backbone Grill. From there we stop in Torrey, Utah at a bed and breakfast in an old school hoiuse and on to the Roaring Fork Valley: Basalt, Snowmass and Aspen. Our return trip will be quick as we head almost immediately to NY and Scotland.

We are leaving Scottsdale at 9:30 in the morning and it is already 96 degrees F. We are alooking forward to cooler weather!

Vermillion Cliffs Hwy
Other than on the Highway, we drove with the top down on our car and enjoyed the 80/90 degree weather and beautiful scenery. We were as high as 7200 feet in altitude in pine forests near Sedona and points north of Flagstaff. We passed through much of Navajo Reservation land with a number of trading posts and small stands selling Native Jewelry, pottery, etc. The only one we visited was Cameron Trading Post which we have visited from time to time over the years. We had a “Navajo Taco” for lunch and checked out their gallery (different from the tourist wares they sell near the restaurant). We found some beautiful earrings to go with the bola that Jack gave me for my birthday.

From Cameron we headed North and then West to head toward the Vermillion Cliffs that surround the Colorado River. Magnificent purple rock carved by nature. We stopped by the Navajo Bridge Center. The bridge was constructed in the 1920s and was important to the development of Northwestern Arizona.

Navajo Bridge

The center also has information about Lee's Ferry, which is a spot just north of the bridge where a family ferried people across the Colorado for 54 years. From 1873 to 1927, Lee's Ferry was the northern gateway to Arizona. We saw a monument erected to the founder, John D. Lee “who with superhuman effort and in the face of almost insurmountable obstacles, maintained this ferry which made possible the colonization of Arizona. He was a frontiersman, trail blazer, builder and a man of great faith, sound judgment and indomitable courage."

However, further research into John Lee suggested a more complicated picture. As we learned during our trip to Casper Wyoming two years ago, the Mormon migration included folks setting up ferrys to cross rivers all along their route. In March of 1864, Mormon pioneer Jacob Hamblin and his men built a raft at the mouth of the Paria and made the first successful crossing at the point on the Colorado that would become Lees Ferry, transporting all fifteen men, their supplies and horses. Hamblin was on a mission to warn the Navajo of northern Arizona to stop making raids into Utah, stealing livestock and threatening Mormon expansion. However war with several tribes ensued. The Mormons started posting guards at what would become Lee's Ferry. In 1870 Hamblin led an expedition with some (now) very famous gentlemen to this spot: John Wesley Powell (who later did much of the exploring of the Grand Canyon), Mormon Church President Brigham Young and another Mormon Leader, John Lee. John Lee was then sent to establish the ferry crossing here not only because of his leadership in the church but supposedly because he had been responsible for a massacre of 120 eastern emigrants. He was excommunicated by the church and his post here at Lee's crossing kept him out of the attention of the church and officials.

John D. Lee, a practicing polygamist, as was common at the time, built stone and wooden homes for the two of his families that lived with him, as well as a dam and an irrigation system for farming. The ranch at Lees Ferry was named Lonely Dell due to its austere remoteness. The Mormon Church provided the lumber and manpower to build the first real ferryboat at Lees Ferry, the Colorado, first launched on January 11, 1873. Although approach roads on either side of the river had yet to be built, wagonloads of colonists began arriving to be ferried across the Colorado River to begin new lives in Mormon settlements in Arizona. Tensions between the Mormons and the Navajo began mounting again in 1874, precipitating the construction of a defensive fort, which was soon converted into a trading post, and later a residence, school, and mess hall. This building, the Lees Ferry Fort, is one of the few historic buildings still intact at Lees Ferry.


In 1877, John D. Lee was executed for his role in the massacre, the only Mormon ever held acountable. Ownership of the ferry operation fell into the hands of Lee's wife, Emma, a capable woman who operated the ferry and farmed the ranch for several years. By this time, the Mormon Church was well aware of the importance of Lees Ferry as a link between settlements in Arizona and Utah. In 1879, the Church bought the ferry rights from Emma Lee for $3,000, and sent Warren Marshall Johnson and his plural families to the ferry to take over operations.

Colorado River Near Lee's Ferry

Lee's Ferry is now the one and only place where you can drive your car right down to the Colorado River! That is also the place where many of the rafting companies put in for the 10 day or two week Colorado rafting trips. I actually saw AZRA (one of my old clients) rafts getting set up to go. We saw more beautiful rock formations and colorful sands in the rock before we headed to Marble canyon and our inn for the evening.
Cliff Dwellers Inn, Marble Canyon

Tomorrow we are off to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and Zion National Park!

August 2, 2009
As many of you may recall, in May we visited Tiger Leaping Gorge in China. It is described as the
Grand Canyon of China." It is a "contender" for the world's deepest gorge. But seeing the Grand Canyon from the North Rim for the first time, was a glorious reminder of the vastness of our Grand Canyon.

Rock on dirt (eroded to look like a mushroom)behind Cliffdwellers; Rock wall behind our room

Starting off at Marble Canyon this morning (Cliffdwellers Inn) we drove 100 minutes to arrive at the North Rim. We drove up in altitude several thousand feet, starting in the Stone House Valley at the base of the Vermillion Cliffs. As we ascended from this desert basin, we wound through Pinion Pines, Fir trees and very windy roads. 30 miles along route 89A and we arrived at the Junction known as Jacob's Lake. There is a small complex of buildings there founded by Nina and Harold Bowman in 1922. They started selling gas at that corner and gradually added buildings-motel, bakery and restaurant, gift shop etc. Now it is an important stopping point as you head south on the one and only road that takes you to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon--42 miles away.
So we headed south through more pine forests and saw the ravages of fires over the past decade or two: very sad. We passed by beautiful meadows and small ponds or lakes. We saw large stands of Aspen tree as well. Often, these seemed to be planted where fires had burned the other trees.
We saw deer and even a condor and some wild turkey. We saw many lovely wild flowers in yellow, purple, blue, red and orange. We passed through the entrance and saw a few places for camping, a few cottages for rent and then the complex with the visitors center, lodge and cabins. And then, one of the most magnificent views one can imagine.

Now I have been to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon several times, including once in the winter with Baleigh when there was snow and clouds and it was a totally different feel. But the north rim is MUCH less crowded (more difficult to access and fewer places to stay) and the views from different points are incredible. 10 Miles separates the North from the South Rim--10 miles of incredible rock formations surrounding the Colorado River. The photos I will share here do not do it justice. We concluded that it would be well worth the drive to come back here and spend several days doing the hikes and visiting more of the million + acres of the Park.
Jack and Leslie standing at Bright Angel's Lookout.


For those who have not been here, the North Rim is on a plateau, the Kaibab Plateau at 8-9000 feet above sealevel. Since the question arose in my head about how big the Grand Canyon is in comparison to Tiger Leaping Gorge, I looked into this:


Depends on how you look at it. The park includes over a million acres of land - 1,218,375.54 acres / 493,077 hectares, to be exact, or 1,904 square miles / 4931 square kilometers. But most people measure the canyon in river miles, along the course of the Colorado River at the bottom of the canyon. By that standard, Grand Canyon is 277 miles / 446 km long. It begins at Lees Ferry (mile 0) and ends at the Grand Wash Cliffs (mile 277 / km 446). The Colorado River is longer, of course: 1450 miles / 2333 km long from the Rocky Mountains of Colorado to the Gulf of California in Mexico. Grand Canyon is only one of many beautiful canyons which the river has carved. Others include Cataract Canyon and Glen Canyon - the latter now beneath the waters of Lake Powell. Most people agree, however, that Grand Canyon is the most spectacular. There's simply no other place in the world that looks quite like it.

Width and depth of the Canyon vary from place to place. At the South Rim, near Grand Canyon Village, it's a vertical mile (about 5,000 feet / 1524 m) from rim to river (7 miles / 11.3 km by trail, if you're walking). At its deepest, it is 6000 vertical feet / 1829 m from rim to river. The width of the canyon at Grand Canyon Village is 10 miles / 16 km (rim to rim), though in places it is as much as 18 miles / 29 km wide. Here's another way to look at size: a trip to the bottom of the Canyon and back (on foot or by mule) is a two-day journey. Rim-to-rim hikers generally take three days one way to get from the North Rim to the South Rim. A trip through Grand Canyon by raft can take two weeks or longer, and experienced backpackers have spent weeks in the more remote areas of the Canyon.

Well, needless to say, in the few hours we spent at the North Rim, we didn't see any remote areas. We visited Bright Angel's Point and the Lodge and went to Cape Royal Trail where we go to see Angel's window and the Colorado River in the distance (actually through the "window").

Our travels were slowed by firemen who were clearing trees that were in danger of falling over the road from fires 2 years ago. We left later than we planned as the area is so compelling-with much to see and do. So we made a quick stop at Jacob's Lake Lodge and picked up there world famous chocolate milk shakes and drank lunch as we drove to Springdale and our jeep tour of the area near Zion National Park.










Our drive tooks us down 4 thousand feet or so and as we descended the temperature got warmer and warmer. It was a pleasant 75 degrees (plus or minus 5 degrees) at the North rim. As we traveled down into the desert again, we reached over 100 degrees again! Oh well, it was a nice respite while it lasted. We drove through Fredonia, not far from Colorado City which was te the town made famous by the FLDS or Fundamental Later Day Saint sect that continued to observe polygamy through current times despite the LDS church banning it in the 1890s and Arizona Attorney General prosecuting those whom they could convict. We heard more about the role of the Mormons settling this region in the mid 19th century from our Jeep tour guide, Steve and later at the visitor center at Zion.

August 2 and 3rd, 2009 Springdale, Utah

We drove north from Fredonia through Kanab and onto route 9 into Zion. It was a long drive-even though the last portion was supposedly only 30 miles...I had been to Zion 11-12 years ago when I was in Las Vegas giving a talk. But I discovered that I only visited a small portion on the Western side of the Park. What I saw then was just a small morsel of a delicious adventure which we were about to enjoy.

Since I had booked a jeep tour for 5:00PM, we were hustling to get to Springdale (which is on the southwestern side of the park) so we rushed through the eastern portion of the Park, knowing that we would come back this way on Monday. But it was hard to resist stopping for hundreds of photos as this was some of the most beautiful country I had ever seen. This even tops Arches National Park which was, heretofor my favorite.

We entered the Park and my mouth dropped open. The slide rock formations were incredible. Then we went through two tunnels. One of which was the longest tunnel ever built when it was built through the rock for a mile in the 1920s. Every so often, there is a "window" looking out of the tunnel at the beautiful landscape all around.

We actually got through the park relatively quickly and found our way to Springdale in time to stop at our Bed and Breakfast and check in. It is a charming place called "Novel Inn" and each room is named after an author: Ours is Walt Whitman. Then we made our way to the adventure center to meet our guide and jeep and head out for a sunset ride of the area. We were joined by a family of 3 in a Mercedes Jeep that could go up 45 degree angles...and had a clearance of over 19 inches--which, it turned out, we needed. We traveled through the towns of Springdale and Rockville (both with populations of a couple of hundred) and a nearby ghosttown called Grafton. Then we traveled up in the mountains to the plateau where we had an incredible view. The trip was challenging in that there didn't appear to be shock absorbers in this versatile vehicle..




Picture from Jeep of rocks we just went over

Steve, our tour guide and driver was from South Africa and seemed to have gained a lot of knowledge about the Southwest, geology, history of native tribes and the "lost tribe" i.e. the Mormons.

He described the occupation of these lands by the Anasazi tribes from the early years of the first millenium through their dispersion 1000 or 1300 years later. The Paiutes claimed to be descendents of these ancient peoples and were peaceful tribes in this area in the 19th century when the first Mormons arrive to settle here. However, as we learned in Lee's Ferry, some of the local tribes (probably the Navajo who were being displaced by the Cavalry) were not so happy with the whitemen and slaughtered local settlers. As we visited several buildings in the Mormon community (now a ghost town) of Grafton, we saw their homes, commnity center/schoolhouses, gravesites and learned of how they lived and died. We saw the two homes of one gentleman(Mr. Russell) who had two wives and a home for each of them.

The Mormons settled dozens of villages throughout this region in an attempt to find self-sufficiency and tolerance for their religion. They sought an area where they could farm cotton as cotton was in short supply with the civil war. The Virgin River which traverses this valley, provided the water needed to grow cotton and fruit trees. in 1859, 5 families settled in Grafton . 3 years later, much of the community was destroyed by floods. However, despite the difficult times, they did have time for music and dancing and the town hall provided the place to do so. However within a few years, the Navajo raids killed too many settlers and the folks in this town joined others in nearby towns to assure more protection. Several gravestones show that the deaths were caused by Indians killing these folks on April 2, 1866.

Steve also pointed out some of the plant/soil life including a concept I had never heard of "cryptobiotic soil." This is a top later of soil that grows when there is very little moisture. It can retain 40 times its weight in moisture. Cryptobiotic crusts are found in dry places all over the world. Much of the ground in the southwestern United States is covered with this soil crust. This crust is filled with cyanobacteria. Lichens, mosses, algae, microfungi, and bacteria are other life in the soil crust.



These living clumps help to hold things together. Ancient cyanobacteria fossils are found in many places. Cyanobacteria have been on the earth for billions of years. They helped change the earth's air from carbon dioxide to oxygen. The groups are held together like threads. When water is available, these threads expand. The soil crusts swell and move. This makes the ground bumpy. Cryptobiotic soil crusts are important to nature. They help stablize the soil. They stop wind and water erosion. They also help feed and water the soil. Apparently they take decades to form and can be destroyed by someone walking on it in minutes.


We also learned about the great sea that covered this area many millions of years ago. The desert was flooded, then collision of plates pushed up some of the land masses, creating great mountains. Then erosion by rivers such as the Virgin River here, created the large canyons. The wind and sands blowing created new laters and new sculptures in these rocks. As we looked from the top of this mesa,we could see the various layers of rock in this incredible geological wonder of the world. How lucky we are to be able to visit such magnificent spots!

Well, we hobbled back to our B&B and happily showered off the dirt and dust from our adventures. We wound our way to a restaurant I had read about (88th Parallel) and had a late, light and magnificent dinner.

Sunday, July 3-Springdale/Zion National Park.
Our B&B is just outside the park in Springdale. They have a great bus system to decrease the traffic and pollution in the Park. So we caught a bus to the park entrance and another within the park. Zion is celebrating 100 years as a national monument/park. We visited the Human History Museum and learned more about the development of this area by the Paiutes and Mormons. Then we headed to the top of the park where the famous formations called "The Narrows" can be found.

We didn't think we would make it all the way up the river (as you have to walk in the river on very unstable footing), but we headed up that way. How breathtaking! At the end of the river-side walk, we stopped. I wanted to try to go further up the narrows and managed to go a way-but not all the way. Still I enjoyed the challenge of heading through the water and over the rocks. I didn't have the right foot gear or walking stick so it was more difficult. Jack and I both enjoyed the beauty surrounding us and the opportunity to hike for the day.

We went back to the Zion Lodge and had lunch, listened to a Ranger talk about Rattlesnakes and took another hike to the "Emerald Ponds". I learned that rattle snakes will use their ability to hide with camoflage as their first defense, their rattle to scare us off as their second and their bite as third. Only 1% of people who are bitten by Rattlesnakes die from it. On the other hand 30% of those exposed to Hunta virus from mice droppings die. So the rattlesnake decreases our risk of death by eating the mice! I guess I won't be as frightened by the rattlers any more!
By this time it was 4:00PM and we were tired and dirty. We headed back to our B&B, had a shower and went off for a dinner at a (former) gas station called The Whiptail Grill. We had incredibly good food-the best Chile Relleno I think I ever had and a grape/walnut/gorgonzola salad that is to die for! In a gas station!!! Only in Utah


Tomorrow, we go to the Eastern part of the park and see the rocks I didn't get to photograph on the way in.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

I woke up this morning in a school house. There was a spinning wheel and carding tools next to the bed. Had I slipped back in time to some older era? I looked outside to lovely gardens with fresh vegetables. Across the street was a church. Next door was a playground. I didn't see any cars on the street. Was this a dream? Oh that's right, we are in Torrey, Utah at a bed and breakfast in the old school house. Ah, there's the flat screen tv and the massage chair. I guess we are still in the 21st century. But like the B&B we were the night before, there weren't many other people there.
Business has been down for these esablishments.

Torrey School House B&B

Yesterday was like a trip through a beautiful painting of color and texture or better yet a sculpture that surrounded us as we drove through Southern Utah mostly on Scenic Highway 12. This is one of my favorite drives as the formations that surround us from time to time are made of the most beautiful designs by a master sculptor.
It started as we left Zion National Park and drove through the Eastern part of the park that we rushed through several days before. We had to stop whenever the road was wide enough for me to take photos.

I wished that I had a 360 degree camera so I could capture the sense of comfort and awe that I felt being surrounded by the rock. It was almost like being in the middle of a rock sculpture looking up and around at very thin layers of rock of modulating shades of pink, white, rust, gold, chocolate or yellow. At times the forms would be rounded and at other times they would like like sand castles that are created with dribbled wet sand. Still others they were like huge muruals that were hundreds of feet tall and seemed to stretch forever. Other pieces were tall, monumental sculptures like skyscrapers.

We only made short rest stops today and took short walks and made our way to one of our favorite restaurants named after part of the road we drove "Hell's Backbone Grill." This reatuarant was started by a couple of Buddhist chefs from San Francisco who found this spot in Southern Utah where they could grow or buy fresh products and make exquisite seasonal food. I had wonderful trout with fresh vegetables and the salad I have been making since we were there 4 years ago and love. Jack had the cowboy meatloaf with a chipotle cream sauce and we shared a chile chocolate pot de creme.We sat out on the porch with the wind moving the aspens that surrounded us. Simply wonderful.

Then we drove the longest 37 miles I've ever driven to Torrey. We moved up in elevation from the desert to aspen and pine forests at over 9000 feet elevation. the road was full of hairpin turns and deer! We saw 8 or 9 deer along the way--including twice where they crossed in front of us! We found our way through sleepy Torrey and our 3-story school house was easy to find. It had been beautifully restored and remodeled to be a bed and breakfast.

The deer that ran off the road!

It is only appropriate to continue our learning since we are in a school house. Here is our geology lesson for the day. I never studied geology while in school and feel woefully ignorant. So it is always helpful to me to gain tidbits of information as we travel through this wonderous laboratory of geology. While we did not stop at Bryce Canyon, we did pass it and saw some of the beautiful hoodoos. We drove through an area called "Grand Staircase, Escalante." So again the "Grand Staircase" comes up. I finally paid attention to these words and learned their reference:
The Grand Staircase refers to an immense sequence of sedimentary rock layers that stretch south from Bryce Canyon National Park through Zion National Park and into the Grand Canyon. In the 1870s, geologist Clarence Dutton first conceptualized this region as a huge stairway ascending out of the bottom of the Grand Canyon northward with the cliff edge of each layer forming giant steps. Dutton divided this layer cake of Earth history into five steps from the youngest (uppermost) rocks:
* Pink Cliffs,
* Grey Cliffs,
* White Cliffs,
* Vermilion Cliffs, and
* Chocolate Cliffs.

Since then, modern geologists have further divided Dutton's steps into individual rock formations. The major sedimentary rock units exposed in the Grand Canyon range in age from 2000 million to 600 million years and were deposited in warm shallow seas and near-shore environments. The nearly 40 identified rock layers of Grand Canyon form one of the most studied geologic columns in the world. ungest exposed formation in the Grand Canyon - the ~240 million year old Kaibab Limestone. The Bryce Canyon area to the northeast continues where the Zion area leaves off by presenting Cenozoic-aged rocks that are 100 million years younger. In fact the youngest formation seen in the Zion area is the oldest exposed formation in Bryce Canyon - the Dakota Sandstone. There are, however, shared rock units between all three, creating a super-sequence of formations that geologists call the Grand Staircase. Bryce Canyon's formations are the youngest known units in the Grand Staircase. Younger rock units, if they ever existed, have been removed by erosion.

Route 12-One "light" portion

These layers have undergone 5000 to 10,000 feet (1500 to 3000 m) of uplift starting about 65 million years ago with the Laramide orogeny which has increased the ability of the Colorado River to cut its channel to make individual plateaus out of the Colorado Plateaus region. The major canyons of the region did not start to form until about five to six million years ago when the Gulf of California opened up and thus lowered the river's base level (its lowest point).

So during this trip, we have traveled up the Grand Staircase from (almost) bottom (Grand Canyon) to top (Bryce Canyon).
We saw great examples of plates pushing up land masses, making the layer go at a 45 degree angle and enhancing the beauty of the designs.

We take off today for Basalt and the Roaring Fork Valley. Unfortunately, most of the travel will be in I-70 which is not that interesting.
Tuesday, August 4-Wednesday, August 5, 2009


We found a new route on this trip that we really liked...rather than traveling the same route (which had a 60+ mile of boring flat driving). We left our cute "bed and breakfast" after a great breakfast. Our drive took us through several small towns such as Bicknell, Loa and Fremont.

These were farming towns with beautiful fields of alphalfa. Mostly a couple of hundred people, one church (LDS) and a few stores. Loa, the county seat, has 500 people living there.
We continued to drive north and east toward I -70 through mountains that reached 9000 feet. (The day before, when we summited on the way to Torrey, we later learned that the mountains around us were 11,000 feet and were the highest plateau in the US).


During this drive on I-70 we saw more beautiful rock formations--much nicer than the area we normally would travel and calculated it out--this was 10 miles shorter and much more interesting.
During our travels, the windshield wiper broke....we knew there were no Jaguar dealers in the Valley so we began to think about how we would fix this in case we got hit by summer thunderstorms. We began researching mechanics in Grand Junction and Glenwood Springs-larger towns on our way and called our dealer. Finally decided to have Jaguar in Scottsdale ship the part (since 10 year old Jaguar parts don't grow on Aspen trees) They had to call CA and had them send them a part and then Jaguar shipped it to us in Aspen. It took only a total of two days. Nice work. This gave us a new riddle to solve on our voyage!


We stopped in Glenwood Springs and went to a farmer's market where we bought some fresh goodies to share with our hosts for the evening, Marjorie and Paul. The temperature was around 90+ and was hotter than we had hoped. But the skies were blue and we enjoyed walking around town. We continued up valley to Basalt where we looked at some stores, galleries, etc before arriving at Paul and Marjorie's home. It was nice to have dinner cooked at home and enjoy catching up with our friends. They spend 1/2 the year in Thailand each year so we enjoyed comparing notes on our lessons from Asia.

Sunset in Basalt

We had dinner outside and watched a beautiful sunset. We organized some of our materials and equipment for the conference we will be conducting....easing me back into the world of work!

Today, Wednesday, we picked up some of the things we needed for the Conference, checked out the facilities, received our car parts and found a mechanic who had the tools to fix it. Yeah!!!

So we will be here through Sunday when we will quickly drive back home via Moab and route 191.
Unless something interesting pops up, We will pick up with our travelogue when we head to Scotland a week from Friday. Take care!!.