Copper Globe
It was the last day of our Utah vacation and we wanted to do something mellow. Copper Globe sounded really interesting with the mining remnants, so we planned on doing that trail for a good portion of the day. Monica had been without her Jeep when the serpentine belt broke on the first day, and she was hoping to have it for the last day. The parts weren't at the shop yet, though, so she wouldn't have it until right before it was time to head back to Colorado. Like the other days, she rode with Mike and had a great time.
We thought about doing the beginning of Eagle Canyon and then using the connector spur to head over to Copper Globe, but everyone wanted to stick to an easier trail for the last day. We would definitely do that another time. That meant we were at the kiosk fairly early in the day, and everyone aired down a bit just in case. It ended up being a trail that you probably wouldn't need to air down for, but it helps with the bumps.
Route finding was a bit challenging at first, but we found a lot of campsites and spurs all over the place. We would definitely remember that spot for later. It's pretty far from civilization, though.
The trail turned away from the campsites and then it was a fun one. It looked like a Moab trail, with sandy spots mixed in with slickrock and little ledges. It was really scenic too, which was nice.
We soon found ourselves at Jensen's Grave, and we took some time to pay our respects. Then we were off to the Copper Globe Mine. We stayed there for a very long time because there was a lot to see. It was cool to see how well everything was preserved a hundred years later. We imagined that most people turned around and headed back to the trailhead, but we wanted to make the full loop so we kept going south.
The trail was less developed from then on, and we enjoyed it. We turned to see the Lucky Strike Mine and wandered around on that spur for a bit. There is a lot of exploring to do in that area. When we got to the overlook, we were happy to see that we got right up to the edge and we had a big view of Reds Canyon below us. We could see where we were on the first day on Hidden Splendor, too, which was cool. It was really windy and not particularly warm, but it was lunch time so we all huddled in a small area blocked by some trees. Any lunch out in the wilderness is a good lunch.
We eventually kept going along the trail and through the canyon, and then it suddenly turned into a maintained trail. Then we were cruising along pretty quickly. When we got to the intersection, we decided to go check out Lone Tree Crossing as a side trip. That was where kayakers could start the hike we did, if they wanted. The water was still moving really quickly. When we were done checking things out we headed back up to I-70. Sid and Charley was right across the highway, so we figured we'd finish with that. We weren't quite ready to be done.
