The last and most amazing Arch

You really cant begin to understand the shear magnitude of mother nature until you have stood below a rock wall towering thousands of feet high. Oh yeah, some parts of these towering fortresses have been around for 100 MILLION YEARS.

As you can imagine my brain was working in overdrive all day yesterday trying to wrap my brain around this concept. 100 Million years. Scientists say that some of the formations began over 300 Million Years ago... Like really people?

Its beautiful. Everywhere you look is another picturesque sight calling for the camera to capture it. Sure enough I came up short so many times after looking thru the view finder. It was almost a waste of time trying to encompass all that these structures portray. All 150 pictures I took are beautiful but I have to warn you that they do not do Arches at all justice. Like the first time I saw the rockies a few days ago, I stared in wonder at the world much greater then me.

Thank you mother nature. You always have a way to put everything in perspective. You think your problems are big or stresses to overwhelming... come here. Its sort of a 'all natural' retreat and Mother Nature is my Guru.

So mom and I had a great drive yesterday. Left at 6a from Vail (sad), arrived at Arches around 10a and then hiked for an astounding 5 hours. We didn't really anticipate this but there was no way we were leaving without seeing almost everything and taking a few hikes. The Delicate Arch Hike was 3 miles but totally worth the 2.5 hours we spent there. There was no alternative. If you go to Arches, you have to go here. It is a test of your endurance, stamina and determination. I promise, your drive will pay off as you turn the corner, on the top of this 600 (ish) foot structure and there it stands. Chillin. I wont go on as you can hardly put into words seeing miraculous structures like this one. Even though it is a huge and unmoving mass, due to its location, time in history and structure form, this arch is truly Delicate. Oh and on the way down, we experienced some of the strongest winds we have ever felt. We now know exactly how these structures have eroded. We were hoping while walking down the path we may erode a little around the edges ourselves. I certainly wouldn't have missed those extra inches :)

I could go on and on but I wont for your own sake. After leaving, we headed north to Salt Lake. We took the scenic route 6 up for 3.5 hours and arrived in Orem accordingly. We wanted to crash. This is why I didn't write last night. I found a PF changs which made me happy and watched the Sunset on Lake Utah. Its beautiful here and there aren't many places in the world like Utah.

We are about to continue on to Sundance in a few so I must break away. I will continue with this later as well as the newest addition from Tahoe :) Ta Ta

(My title refers to the St. Louis Arch, the million golden arches we passed and the Delicate Arch.)