Driving South and West into Utah, we were encouraged to take a more scenic route. That’s all part of the adventure, after all. There is an awful lot of nothingness throughout our great country. Miles upon miles of mountains, dirt, farms and ranches, twisty turns and even abandoned ghost towns!
We stumbled into Cisco, Utah, and were immediately cautious about getting too close. The buildings (and there were only a handful of them anyway) were torn apart and graffitied over, abandoned and neglected.
We quickly Googled what happened to this town, and why. Turns out, the town was once bustling as a railroad and livestock shipping hub at the turn of the last century. But once I70 was constructed, bypassing the town was their death nail. The town was eventually purchased by an artist who dreamed of creating an artist haven here. She’s been welcoming visitors and artists for more than a decade now, trying to rebuild Cisco, one building and mural at a time.
The town has been featured in numerous films and songs. It’s worth a stop, about 40 miles from Moab, off Route 128, just for the sheer curiosity of ghost towns and oddities.
Of course, the true fun begins as you enter the Moab area, following along the endless Colorado River, which seems to appear and reappear, following you along the winding mountain roads. Towering red rock mountains loom overhead, that scary switchback and climb, and again, few guardrails along those edges of roads.
The river at this time of year is a milk-chocolate color due to the evening rains which churn up the red silt and rock. Other times, the Colorado River is an emerald -colored green. I loved gazing out my window at every turn to see if it was still “following” us.
We gazed at the outside temperature as it continued to climb past 100 degrees on our arrival day. We couldn’t help but wonder how cool and breezy our little home in south Florida was faring! It seems the whole country is immeshed in a heat wave, but being in the desert, the sun felt closer to my burning skin.
Along our route, about 10 miles before the town limit, we stumbled upon an accident, a man was badly injured, and swarms of other drivers were stopped to offer assistance. We didn’t see what had happened, but we figured he took a turn and flipped his truck. A bad omen for our trip? No, just a cautionary reminder to take it slow and easy on our adventures and these twisty, curvy, cliff roads.
We spent the next five days at another Sun Outdoors RV park, one we had actually been to seven years ago on our first RV trip. It sits in the middle of Moab and is central to most of the activities the downtown and surrounding parks offer.
Moab was settled around 1902 by Mormon settlers who farmed the lands until the 1950’s when major Uranium deposits were found and mined. Of course, the lands were originally settled by Ute and Navajo tribes. Before the Native Americans, there is evidence of ancient inhabitants, the semi-nomadic Archaic and Fremont cultures who left behind extensive rock art and pit houses. We drove past signs and saw these petroglyphs. Last time we were in Moab, we saw evidence of the first creatures to live in these parts, the mighty dinosaurs!
We truly are just blips in time. There’s nothing like the mountains to bring much needed perspective to your life!