We leave the Moab region and head to The Needles section of Canyonlands National Park which is about a 2-hour drive after a half-hour detour around a closure on highway 221. We are staying at The Needles Outpost, an interesting little campground that shares roads and borders with the park and the national forest. We had to “make our own shade” with the canopy out on the sun side and cool breezes coming in the windows on the shade side. Tony worked for awhile in the shade.

The Needles Outpost is a good place to stay if you can’t get into the park’s campgrounds. It’s super close to the visitor’s center and has rocks all around the campground to climb. The owner is very strict about the 5 mph speed limit and told us that she has chased speeders down when they violate the policy. We behaved. There is evidence that we aren’t the only critters climbing up here. There are some teepees in some of the campsites.