We got to Arches about 2pm and stopped at the visitor’s center. We learned a bit more about the exciting wonders we would see in the park. After about an hour at the visitor’s center we decided to move on. Maybe I should say move up, up into the park. From where the visitor’s center is you have to drive up a zig zag road along one of the red sandstone cliffs to get into the rest of the park. After driving for about thirty minutes we got to the first trail head, “Park Avenue Trail”. We had read about the many wonders we would see here.
About a week before we left I told all of the kids to research Arches and let me know what hikes they wanted to go on. Like many of the larger national parks Arches is huge, over a hundred square miles. Because of this I figured there was likely more we would want to do than we would have time for so I wanted to have a list of priorities. We had gotten down to only a couple days before our trip and none of the kids had done anything. So I resorted to very severe actions, I told them they were not allowed to play any video games until I had a list from each of them. I got all of the lists in about an hour.
Mommy compiled all of their lists onto a map and “Park Avenue Trail” was the first one after you go up into the park. This trail had many natural wonders to see, so we were all excited to see them. Maybe we were all just ready to be out of the car for a while and have a good walk to stretch our legs.
At the parking lot you looked down onto the trail. It winds between two huge rows of sandstone towers. The sight was just amazing, but we knew there were more amazing things to see as we went down the trail.
As you walk between these natural towers you are told to look at specific rock formations. Some of them look so real that they are named after what they look like. Here above the kid’s heads you can see one of them.
There is the three old women, or maybe it was the three maids, or the three sisters. Well either way it is is three females, but you can’t really see them because I was focusing on the kids the three, whoever they are, just kind of snuck into the picture and it is just a side view of them. Who wants to see some ones arms and legs anyway.
But later we got to a REALY exciting one, so I made sure to get some good pictures of it. This is the BIG
Pickle. Some of these “images” take a lot of imagination to see. But this one was quite clear. Well mostly clear. At first Sarah though it was the big cucumber, I think that might be on a different trail, but this was clearly the BIG Pickle. This was one of those moments where seeing just isn’t enough you have to touch it.
Or maybe more. You have to stand on it. You have to conquer the BIG Pickle. No even that isn’t enough you have to…
Hug the BIG Pickle? I’m not really sure what they were doing there. But rest assured the BIG Pickle was honored and admired and played on and well we will just pass on whatever else went on with the BIG Pickle.
Oh, I almost missed it. There above the BIG Pickle is the three maids, three sisters, well whoever they are there they are. But who cares about them when you have the BIG Pickle right there.
One really strange thing though, the visitors guide on the trail didn’t say anything about the BIG Pickle. I’m not sure how they managed to miss the most obvious of all of the great natural sandstone sculpture.