Montezuma Canyon, Utah

Before we left Parowan, the National Weather Service had predicted sun for Thursday. It was our one chance. Unfortunately, the prediction was a day late; or a day early, depending on your point of view. For us, the view on Thursday was of clouds, and wind, and rain, and . . . did I mention mud? I had hoped to go back to Comb Wash and Road Canyon since San Juan County does a pretty good job with those roads. Actually, only a rookie would leave the pavement after a week of rain, but, as I said, it was our one chance. About four miles up, we hit a very snotty patch, lost traction even with FWD, and slid sideways with the driver's rear tire dropping into a wash. Fortunately it was a shallow wash; plenty of side washes are large enough to swallow a pick-up, but this wasn't one of them. It may have been a rookie move, but I wasn't going to do it twice: We turned around and went back to the highway.

So, then, we tried Montezuma Canyon. The gas companies were working over there, surely the roads would be better? Well, they were better, and they were worse. They were better because they were built wide for the drilling rigs and putting it right down the middle meant that you weren't going to slide off unless you slid for 100 feet. They were worse, because all of that road surface had sucked up enough rain to float Noah, and the mud was deep. Deep. There were some places . . . flat places . . . where FWD and an open throttle were required simply to inch forward . . . with wheels churning and mud flying. Needless to say, we didn't go far. I think we got to Max Dalton's well, but I could be wrong about that. In any case, we spent an hour or two walking around the side canyons looking at glyphs and a few small ruins, including the one above. By then it was late and we spent the rest of the day dredging our way back to asphalt.