Built To Roam: Arches, Arches and more Arches

If one thing is for sure, there is a shit load of arches in Utah. I don't technically know how many arches it takes to make a shit load, but I do know that Utah would definitely meet that criteria. In Arches Natural Park alone there are over 2000 natural stone arches, not to mention countless more throughout red rock country in Utah and the West at large. There was too much to see on this trip to spend much time visiting arches, and as we came to learn, if you've seen a few arches, you've seen them all. I don't say this to downgrade the awesomeness that is an arch of rock sculpted over the ages to form a natural bridge, I say it because after seeing a few you start to get desensitized to it. So on this trip we decided on three short hikes to three very different arches that I felt encompassed everything they had to offer. First we would hike to Delicate Arch in Arches National Park, Utah's poster child, portrayed on their license plate and just about anything else that is advertising Utah. Second a hike to Corona Arch, just outside of Canyonlands, made famous recently on YouTube by claiming to be the world's largest rope swing. If your interested, and you should be, watch the video here. And finally, Mesa Arch, located in Canyonlands National Park's Island in the Sky District. All three offered something different and unique, and since each one had to be hiked to, it gave me a great opportunity to work on the blisters that had been forming by this point in the trip.
So our first stop on the Arches tour took us to Delicate Arch which was our one and only hike in Arches National Park, also know for being Canyonlands bigger, more popular older brother. The hike itself was three miles round trip over open exposed slick rock, and since it was quite windy that day (gusts up to 55mph) there was plenty of dust and debris flying around. This was also the most crowded hike as everyone and their brother is likely to do this hike if they are in the area due to it's iconic image. After getting to the arch the wind was almost unbearable and we watched countless people (Including Nicole) lose their sunglasses and hats off the side of the mountain. So after waiting in line to snap a pic in front of the arch, which was pretty incredible looking I might add, we headed back the way we came down the trail to the cars. On the way back someone had opened shop with all the hats and sunglasses he had scavenged at the bottom. All and all a must do hike, nothing to spectacular, but if you go on the right day I'm sure there isn't too bad of a crowd and the arch is worth seeing.
The second hike was to Corona Arch, and like Delicate Arch, it was a 3 mile round trip hike. The trailhead for this hike was on the bank of the Colorado River, the architect for a lot of the Canyons in the West, Including the Grand Canyon. There was some sort of Hippy tent convention going on that I wanted to be a part of, but forced myself to set out on the trail anyways. Much fewer people on this hike (maybe 6-7 total) and as we approached the Arch we could see incredibly that there was a group of people that had actually set up and were doing the rope swing. This was a complete surprise to me because I just assumed it had been a one time thing for that video, and now I was seeing it live in front of me. So after we hiked up to the arch we talked with the dudes that set up the rope swing and watched one of them do it. It was 10 times more bad ass to see it in person and I wished that I could have somehow convinced them to let me try it. They told us that for a test run they filled a backpack up with rocks and rigged it to the rope and threw it off. After the rope failed and the backpack came plummeting down, they promptly flipped a coin to see who would try it first. What? Yeah. So I gave the guy who I watched rope swing my contact info so he could snag the pictures from me then we headed back to the car, stopping only to take a classic girl-tied-to-the-train-tracks-by-evil-villain picture, which of course is a staple of any trip to the wild west.
And finally on our last day in Moab did the sort hike out to see Mesa Arch, which is on the edge of a Mesa, creating a natural frame of the Canyonlands below. Most people who visit Canyonlands make the 0.5 mile trek out to the arch and snap a picture, many of which do so at sunrise. We on the other hand did not, and since we maaay or may not have drank to much and spoke like British Royalty the night before, saw it quite a bit closer to sunset than sunrise. Not much to write about hike-wise since it was so short, but the views at the Mesa were extraordinary, made even better by the fact that there was a pretty sweet arch over the cliff. So we took our pictures on the arch and headed back to the car. Utah has an incredible amount of must see landmarks and countless miles of wild space to explore, and if you do make your way out there, make sure you devote at least some time to seeing a few of the arches it has to offer.

Mileage: 6.5 Miles