The Sunday of Labor Day weekend I drove from where I had been staying in Joseph, Utah east on I-70 to get to Grand Junction, Colorado, where I would be spending two nights. Along the way I was planning to stop at Arches National Park to see one small area of the Park which wasn’t open to the public when I was there a few days earlier.
Shortly before getting to the entrance for Arches I saw these colorful rock formations not far off the road.
When I got to the entrance for the Park I saw there was a huge line of traffic waiting to get in. I decided not to get in all that mess and further down the road, just before getting to the little town of Moab, I turned left and got on a scenic road which would take me back to the dreaded interstate.
Route 128 took me for a very pleasant drive alongside the Colorado River. Huge, reddish-brown rock mountains lined both sides of the road, towering hundred of feet it the air. This went on for about 20 miles!
The road briefly turned away from the river and got more desert-like (and heated up…. the highest temperature I saw on the car thermometer was 106!).
Eventually I got back alongside the river for a few more miles.