Moab, Utah

Here are a few pictures of our trip to Moab.  I'll post some graduation pictures this weekend. The first set of pictures were taken in the needles section of canyonlands national park. We did a 10+ mile hike through the desert to walk through some narrow slot canyons and get good views of the needles.

All smiles before the hike. 

Still smiling as we head into the desert.

An unposed group picture. From left to right it's Nick, Sara, Mike, Leslie and Andy. 

A picture of Sara leaning againts the base of a cliff.

The needles seen from an overlook. The area is full of these huge spires hundreds of feet tall.

Sara and Mike go down the stairwell to enter the slot canyons.

Andy walking through the canyon. There was around half a mile of hiking through these canyons that weren't more than 2 or 3 feet wide. They were between 20 and 100+ feet deep.

The group walks through the canyons trying not to get lost. They are a little bit maze like. This picture gibes you a sense of how high the canyon walls were.

Nick takes a picture of the exit from the canyon maze.

A lizard enjoying the sun on a rock.

A couple of ill formed needles.

Nick resting the shade of a small cave.

Ancient (and not so ancient) wall carvings on the outskirts of the park.

The second day in Utah we went to Arches National Park which was just a couple of miles outside of Moab.

Mike standing in an arch looking across at delicate arch. It's the most famous arch in the park and on the Utah license plates.

A view of the area around delicate arch.

A frog in a nasty stream full of algae. He seems to be loving it.

North arch. The people hiking around the base give you a sense of the scale.

Can't remember the name of this one, but it has a small arch just to the left of the large one.

Delicate arch from across the chasm.

Sara and I standing under delicate arch. The approach was a little bit nerve racking, but it was worth it to get this picture.

Sara strikes the pose on the slick rock that we hiked over to get to delicate arch.

A huge letsrun fan? I wanted to wait and talk to the driver, but no one else was interested.