Moab, Utah

by Paula Peterson | May 14, 2018 | National Parks, RVing, Utah

After a good night’s sleep and breakfast at Ruby’s we fueled up, washed our windows and headed out toward Moab. We drive on Scenic Byway 12 – an “All American Highway” – the highest designation of US scenic byway system and soon enter The Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.

We traveled past many small towns where most families are alfalfa farmers or ranchers. It was interesting to me that the growing season is only 120 days, just three months long!

All of a sudden, we dropped into incredible switchback turns over high white cliffs. The landscape shifted from red to white in a second as we took a turn in the road. Drive some more, and now it’s red again as we fly through Capitol Reef National Park.  Sheer red cliffs and azure blue skies!  Who knew?  An unexpected treat on the road!  Now, finally left on Route 24 and we are traversing flat, wide open expanses of nothingness.  Utah goes on forever!

Finally, we are crossing over the Colorado River and literally flying (80 MPH is the speed limit) toward Moab. It’s warm and dry and amazingly beautiful!

We are booked at the ACT Campground and Environmental Learning Center, a green powered sustainable campground in Moab. Moab is surrounded by the La Sal Mountains, and we travel through a long busy retail area that is chock full of outfitters.  Here you’ll find someone to take you kayaking, hiking, white-water rafting, climbing, mountain biking, hang-gliding, scenic helicopter tours and lots more.  The entire town caters to the adventure seekers among us with retail shops for their gear and lots of restaurants to feed the hungry after a day’s adventuring. Moab also has lots of chain motels with busy pools, designed to cool you off after time in the desert sun.

Our campground is geared to the environmentalist, so there is no pool. There are yurts, and lots of tents and a smallish section for RV’s. It featured a communal indoor kitchen and an outdoor kitchen.

The big disappointment is the lack of a pool, but they advertise the “Ol’ Swimming Hole” a short distance away. It’s a Bureau of Land Management property, and sounded great, an earth friendly way to cool off in the hot desert sun and would make up for the lack of a pool.  What a bust!  We gave it a try but RV’s cannot make it down the road to access this swimming hole, there wasn’t even a place to park an RV and hike in.  No points for “truth in advertising” for this RV Park.