Arches Ntnl Park, Delicate Arch hike

Again, the alarm sounded at 5:30, but I didn’t get around to moving until 6:30. As much as I want, I just can not bring myself to get going that early. After my two cups of coffee, I took the half-hour drive into Arches National park to the Delicate Arch trail head as planned. The guide says 1.5 miles each way and to allow 2-3 hours. I have to be back out of the park by noon to assure I could accomplish my daily work, and this was enough time to do the hike. It was still raining from the night before, not much more then drizzle (humid as heck!), but I decided to make the trek to the arch anyway. The trail was already filling with people at 7:30am, but I double-timed it to pass by the tour group of screaming Chinese families. Then the trail got tough; heading up the slick-rock was heating me up so much that my jacket was no longer keeping the wet out, but in. I removed the jacket and packed it in the back-pack and kept on moving. I just happened to be hiking right along side a guy from Poland so we chatted it up on the way up to the Arch. As we came to the arch, the rain stopped, giving us the time to thoroughly enjoy this feat of nature to it’s fullest. The guy from Poland snapped a shot of me standing under the arch (center image below) and I did the same for him. This was a very cool pay-off to such a short hike and I am happy I did it, even in the rain. heck, it would have been a hundred times worse if the sun were out.