The Wonder for Me and You

After three rapid-fire days in Zion, Bryce Canyon, and Capitol Reef National Parks, one after another after another, I trek eastward across Utah to Moab, near the border of Colorado, where I will hunker down for a few days. It’s tempting to go even further east, to discover even more national parks awaiting me just across the state line, but a growth path for me comes in the art of staying, stopping, and drawing lines somewhere.

For BiGTRiP V, I draw the line at Moab: a touristy city bounded by towering orange walls of rock, conveniently on the doorstep of not just one but two national parks: Canyonlands and Arches.

I will have three days to split between these two parks while anchoring each night at a hotel. Getting my first shower in a few days is high atop my priority list after all these 100-plus-degree hikes. Arun checks me in at the hotel next door, which apparently he also owns, inviting me to call him on his personal cell phone if I ever need anything. He invites me to take a picture of his number on a card, and I do so even though I can’t imagine a scenario in which I’ll need to call him about anything.

Pin that thought.

I check into my room back at the hotel next door. I unload my things, shower blissfully, and crash on the bed where sleep captures me for a half-hour. I awaken at dinnertime and make the convenient stroll next door to a Mediterranean restaurant. Praise God.

I return to my room with my dinner in tow and open the door — where a dark, winged creature darts from the doorway to the opposite side of my room. I shriek, stepping back and bending down with my dinner bag, hoping the bird will see the door’s opening, double back, and fly out.

Only, wait.
That’s not a bird.
That’s a bat.
A freaking bat in my hotel room.

The bat lands on the opposite wall and just sits there. Unbothered. It’s as if I’d poked it while it was sleeping, and now it’s rolled over to the opposite wall and hit the snooze button.

I prop the door open and sit down on a bench outside my room, pulling out my phone. I know just the man to call.

“Arun?”

“Yes sir! How can I help you?”

“Um, so there’s a bat in my room.”

“A back??”

“No, a bat. B-A-T.”

“A bat??”

“A bat.”

“I’ve never seen a bat in one of our rooms!”

“Well.”

Arun encourages me to hold on and that he’ll be over soon to help. I imagine he’s calling animal control or pest control or whatever department of control one calls to eliminate a bat from a hotel room. But no. Arun recruits his head housekeeper with a broom, and they enter my hotel room together as Bat Force One. It’s giving Dwight from The Office vibes.

The bat, however, has since moved locations, no longer visible on the living room wall. The two of them hunt it down in the bathroom, shutting the door behind them and making their own shrieks as it darts about the room. Eventually, the bat flies out the open window.

Arun apologizes for the inconvenience and upgrades me from my queen-sized bedroom to the king-sized bedroom next door, and all is once again well in my bat-free world. It’s an affirmation of this much needed art of staying put, of not feeling the need to keep going, going, going. It’s okay to stop for a while. It’s more than okay to be upgraded to a king-sized bed for four nights.

Now, where was I?

Ah, yes. Canyonlands National Park.

Canyonlands is almost too massive and too epic to enjoy properly. I can’t interact with the place like I do other parks. I can’t climb down into it alongside the  hoodoo armies of Bryce Canyon, or even grab chains and intimately cling to the top of Angel’s Landing in Zion. Canyonlands is a gigantic brown hole, filled with lots of other snaking big brown holes, which you observe from standing high up and far, far away.

Exploring the visitor center at Canyonlands’ Island in the Sky district, I learn that there are actually three districts in Canyonlands, each separated by many hours of driving. The other two districts are more inaccessible but probably more rewarding the deeper you descend into the canyons. I can squint from the cliffs and see some Jeep trails in the dust a long way off. How epic a ride would that be?

I’m still glad to visit Island in the Sky in Canyonlands, of course, still happy to notch another national park in my belt, though Arches beckons more of my time and energy — and wonder — over the next couple days.

Driving through Arches feels like a theme park, like Jurassic Park, all of the arches and other rock formations like funky orange decor. I expect to find only three or four arches, including the famed Delicate Arch, the state symbol of Utah which adorns her license plate. But there are quite literally arches at every bend: standalone arches, side-by-side arches, even arches on top of arches and arches within other arches. The “Double Arch” feels like a villain’s lair, sweeping bows of rock with exposed windows on all sides. You can hike up to all of them, touch them, stand beneath them, stretch out your arms and bask inside of them, the inverse of untouchable Canyonlands.

I watch the sunset sitting across a chasm from Delicate Arch, the size of my pinky nail. It’s a lovely teaser of the next morning’s trek, as I plan to hike up to the Delicate Arch’s doorstep.

It feels something like a pilgrimage, hiking there. The park’s signage boldly proclaims it the most famous arch in the world, even more than the manmade arches in St. Louis and Paris. It’s certainly the world’s most famous natural arch.

My hike takes about an hour in the cool of this 7am morning. “There’s still a rainbow over the arch if you hurry,” one guy says as he intersects my path toward the end.

The reveal is unlike any other hike I’ve experienced: the final narrow path along a rock wall that suddenly opens, and there she stands, a bow of orange rocks cobbled together in the middle of an amphitheater.

Sure enough, a rainbow blazes over Delicate Arch, as if the moment needed an extra dash of magic.

I sit and stare at the thing for what seems like hours. Other hikers step down to take their turns getting pictures, and I just sit there beholding its glory. I wonder what the first person ever to walk around that bend to discover such a sight must have thought. 

It feels like entering a cathedral or an outdoor throne room, as if the arch is more than just the throne but the king himself — regal, set apart, awaiting his daily audience of admirers. Count me among the adorers.

I lose count of the arches I discover over my time in Arches. Ten, twelve? I hike for hours that morning before the triple digit heat cripples me, constantly lathering up on sunscreen, refilling my water bottles at every opportunity. I want to see as much as I can while I’m here, hiking as many trails as I can follow, knowing I may never again return to Arches.

I really, really hope I do. Some parks I’m content with seeing once and never again. But not Arches.

I can’t help thinking this would be an awesome park to plunder with my little nieces, my family. Climbing on all the rocks, oohing and ahhing at these magnificent structures that formed through the millennia, getting some precious photos together.

There is the bliss of traveling solo, but there is another joy of sharing such gorgeous places with people you love.

I spend an “off day” at Bonjour Bakery, my little Moabite haven. I catch up on some reading and journaling, continuing to stay off social media as I grow more proud of this aspect of this year’s BiGTRiP. I have so much I want to say to my followers, so much I want to show them and constantly check in with them about, and yet I know there will be a time for it all (even if it takes many months for me to write about my experiences).

Bonjour reminds me of this coffee shop I found in Juneau, Alaska on my BiGTRiP from a couple years ago, a cafe I frequented to reflect and recharge from all my explorations beyond the window. My time is running short for BiGTRiP V with just a day left and one final course to follow.

I feel the duality of my emotions stirring: of remaining present while I am still here on this trip, still appreciating this wonder in my midst; and also of feeling eager to hop back on a plane, having properly discovered and honored the wonder for myself, now sharing the wonder with you.