Week 4….Capitol Reef Surprise!

After just my first day in Capitol Reef National Park, I want to spend the rest of my summer here.

Not only does it have a great location (only 2 hours from Moab, the middle point between Arches and Canyonlands national park), but it also has the most amazing housing and people.

Before I came here, my supervisor told me I would be staying in a dorm. When I heard the word “dorm,” my thoughts immediately flashed back to freshman year when I had to share a dorm room with the grossest little dude ever. Along with the fact that I would be living in a dorm, was the idea that I would be trekking over 20 miles with my supervisor in 90-degree southwestern heat. The night before we left, I barely got any sleep. I was dreading my time in Capitol Reef. I guess I still underestimated my luck.

The “dorm” turns out to be a 2-story house in a quaint little neighborhood sitting at the foot of a beautiful, red, purple, and green 500-foot-tall rock face. 3 other guys had been living there; one is a seasonal interpreter, one is a seasonal astronomer, and the other is a seasonal maintenance worker. All great guys and we immediately hit it off; more great friends to add to the list.

On top of that surprise, the newest addition to the cultural resources staff, a young archaeologist from Indiana, would be joining my supervisor and I on our 20-mile roadside survey. The young archaeologist turns out to be a pretty cool dude from Indiana, and we end up having plenty to talk about while we hiked along the roadside looking for artifacts. We even decided to hike after work to take a look at some petroglyphs (ancient rock art), the historic Mormon pioneer register, and hike up to the rim view point to catch sunset. The hike was incredible. Capitol Reef is, although very different from Bryce, a wonderfully beautiful place.

After the hike, he introduced me to a new brew from Indiana called Upland. It was pretty damn delicious.

Throughout the rest of the week, we worked on our survey. The survey consisted of walking 10 miles of roadside (20 counting both sides), looking for historic and prehistoric artifacts. Some of the things we found, for example, were arrowhead bases and midsections, civilian conservation corps (CCC) campsites with old soda bottles and tin cans, and even collapsed bridges.

During our 20-mile survey, I couldn’t help but enjoy the scenery. Some of the flowers were in bloom and, of course, the 300-foot cliff faces were wonderful to look at.

Enjoy the pictures!