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UTAH Part 5 - May 14-21, 2016

Woke up well rested just before sunrise at the Red Cliff Ranch. I'm glad we had a good nights sleep to prepare us for what would prove to be a very active day. My wife and I left our daughter to snooze a little longer while we took a walk to enjoy the sunrise and what a marvelous sunrise it was! We grabbed coffee and hot tea at the lodge and moved outside to the large deck that overlooks the Colorado River. Utah and especially this incredible place surrounded by towering red canyon walls sure puts on an amazing light show both at sunrise and sunset. Did I mention how fresh the cool morning air smells here? We were happy to see the beautiful weather since we had a trail ride scheduled at 0930.






We rustled up the college girl and grabbed a great breakfast at the lodge. Properly fueled up we headed for the corral, opening rusty pasture gates and crossing a babbling brook. FYI, it has been years and years since we have been on a horse and I'll tell you I wasn't too sure how my butt was going to like a 2-1/2 hour trail ride through the canyons?! We met our guides Devin and Heather and a young couple at the corral. The staff at Red Cliffs are fantastic and Devin and Heather were the best! After a quick but thorough briefing we were mounting up and ready to go! My daughter was introduced to gentle Winston, my wife fell in love with stubborn Bon Jovi and I thoroughly enjoyed my big rocking chair Gunsmoke, who by the way was a former Amish buggy horse, very large four legged gentleman! Soon it was happy trails!!












The casual ride took us through the most amazing country side, I envisioned John Wayne riding this range while shooting Rio Grande here many moons ago. We enjoyed great conversations along the way and were in awe of the pristine surroundings that not many have wandered. We would see flowering cactus, small colorful lizards, tiny ground squirrels and fields of amazing yellow flowers, simply beautiful.







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The ride lasted 2-1/2 hours and we were so comfortable and having such a great time that we didn't want it to end, but the horses obviously loved having the saddles removed so they could roll around in the dirt, ha!

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Once back over the babbling brook we had a couple hours to relax before our next adventure. My wife went for a short jog, daughter worked on a project and I grabbed a beer and headed to the pool where we would all meet up. We had to be in Moab at 2:30 so we had a light lunch at the ranch and were soon off to try ZIPLINING for the first time! We arrived at the Raven's Rim Zipline Adventure Center on time and were fitted for our safety harnesses and helmets. The "adventure" has an exciting start with a thrilling 4 wheeler ride up the canyons rock trail that would be seriously difficult to simply walk.

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20 minutes later we were walking onto a mountain top with incredibly long panoramic views. Carefully walking along a fairly narrow ledge to the first of 6 ziplines, 2 of which were 1/4 mile in length. Another treat along the way was a bouncy suspension foot bridge that spanned a very deep gulley, tried not to look down while the bridge was bouncing....but I did ugh!

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At the end of this exhilarating 3 hour excursion we enjoyed the beginnings of a beautiful sunset on our descent from the canyon. I have to admit I was a bit apprehensive about this adventure, especially when I saw what a small cable stretch out 1/4 mile between 2 rocks looks like, but I would do it again in a heartbeat! We stayed in downtown Moab for a couple hours and grabbed some wings and beer at the local Brew House where we talked and laughed about what an amazing day we had!

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To be continued........CHEERS!