uranium arch

Northern Utah (and its ski areas) has been having a bit of a dry patch lately, which encouraged us to throw our hiking stuff in the truck for another Moab weekend.  I picked out Saturday's hike - to Uranium Arch - not only because it looked like a good one for solitude this time of year, but also because it looked really exposed (i.e., little to no shade) which we wouldn't want to do later into the spring/summer.

Courthouse Rock

The trailhead is north of town, in the Mill Canyon multi-use area.  In this case, "multi-use" means hiking, MTBing, equestrian, dirt bikes and OHVs, BLM camping and dinosaur tracks.  Our trail guide suggested that we could drive in a ways to park but there was a wash crossing that looked a little wet so we ended up at the main staging/parking lot.  It's a big lot, with a pit toilet and corrals for horses; we were only of only three vehicles parked there.

Signs, signs, everywhere a sign

Parking where we did added another 2+ miles to the round trip but it's pretty easy hiking: mostly jeep roads, with some sand and some slick rocks ledges.  Basically all you do is follow the signs to the M&M (Monitor and Merrimac) trail/Uranium Arch.  Other than the sign showing the turn-off of the M&M trail towards the arch which is on the back side of the sign post, this trail is amazingly well signed.  It's good that it is because this area has lots of jeep roads, all just waiting to be explored.

Uranium Arch

Uranium Arch (there's actually no uranium in the vicinity) is a good-sized arch, overshadowing an alcove in the rock.  In the summer, that alcove will provide the only shade in the area.  A local conservation group has protected the feature, roping off a parking area for jeepers.  We had it to ourselves.

Not impressed with the boots

In addition to exploring new territory, this hike was Milton's first real outing with his new boots.  We got them for him because we do so much hiking with him on slickrock, which is very abrasive: this makes for excellent MTBing but is hard on dogs' paws.  He also tends to get a lot of cactus spines and goatheads in his feet when he explores off the trail.  Saturday was Milt's third time wearing the boots and although he did walk a little funny, he figured it out quickly.  He didn't like them at all - and registered his protest by trotting ahead, sitting in some shade until we caught up and then trotting ahead again, instead of ranging and racing far afield - but he likes hiking so much that he was willing to put with them.

The boys descending the slickrock shelf below Courthouse Rock

This was (I think) our longest hike of the winter thus far and we were all glad to take off our boots when we got back to the truck.  There was a moderate amount of activity in the parking lot for us to watch as we had beers and snacks (Milton got extra dog cookies for being a good sport): picnickers, dinosaur groupies, dirt bikers, range cows, etc.  We also checked out the kiosk that listed the equestrian rides; since we can hike anything a horse can do, we noted several other loops for us to come back and explore at a later time.  So many places to go!

This rock formation was so unusual 

and we only found it in this one spot

Hike stats:  8.66 miles; 2:41 hours and 3.2 m.p.h. moving average / 3:03 total time and 2.8 m.p.h overall; 930 feet of elevation