Post #3078646

@vapaad@wandering.shop well the Flaming Gorge Reservoir is actually a fun place in and of itself to do some kayaking or water recreation of your choice (YMMV on dealing with the usual summer boating crowds...)! The Sheep Creek Geologic Loop is an *amazing* driveable (most of the time) loop through some really scenic areas and of course, fascinating geology (plus bighorn sheep 💙). Going south of the Gorge towards Vernal there are a few cool dinosaur trackways that are also cool back-canyon drive/hikes. I can't remember the specific names but one of them is just across the road from the huge evil Simplot Mining project unfortunately. Mostly just as a landmark of where to find it. Also close to Vernal is Steinaker State Park, which is part of the national Dark Sky park registry, and also trails & stuff. Vernal itself has a really decent Field History Museum for more dinosaurs and geology (plus a tiny bit of indigenous history) and the Museum of Uinta County has some more in-depth indigenous historical content. But for me, the best part of just getting up into the Uinta Mountains in the Ashley National Forest! There are so many places to hike, camp, ride horses, (Red Canyon Lodge is another place to look for more info on those activities – I'd give the Flaming Gorge Lodge itself a miss cuz when I was up there last year they had an employee with a fuckin White Power tattoo). Also in July/Aug there's this sweet old ex-Park Ranger guy who does talks around the area on stuff like the drought ecology of the Green River and the Night Sky and the Mustang Ridge Fire. Last year I was his audience of one for two of those talks and it was really fun. He's pretty rad. Red Canyon and the surrounding area itself is also awesome, both land and water (the Reservoir and the Green River). Beautiful mixed ecology high arid grassland plus subalpine ponderosa/aspen and juniper/sagebrush. Probably quite similar to where you're at, but I always love the huge diversity of those ecosystems 💙 Also also, since I've been an adult I've never been there at the right time for it but the Ute Reservation has an annual powwow around July 4th, I've always wanted to go! (https://utetribe.com/) Haha sorry, I could go on. I spend time there every summer if I can and there's always more I discover every time, even after all these decades. I hope you do get to go and you find something to fall in love with there! I'd love to make it further down your way one of these times, too, I haven't been around the greater region there much since I was a kid!