Ghost towns, Sego Canyon petroglyphs, Dead Horse Point State Park & Solar Evaporation Ponds!
Driving from Goblin Valley SP to Thompson Springs, Utah.
Although Thompson Springs is not officially a ghost town, there are plenty of abandoned structures. These were just down the road from the campground, which is owned by the Ballard family.
These guys were always sitting in the same place at the entrance to the campground. Thank goodness, they never waved!
Some of the scenery just outside the campground in Thompson Springs.
A few miles down a dirt road from Thompson Springs are the Sego Canyon Petroglyphs, some of which are life-sized. According to the Bureau of Land Management, this site contains 3 culturally distinct styles of rock art.
A couple miles further is Sego Cemetery.
Henry Ballard first found coal on land adjacent to his ranch. The community that sprang up was first called Ballard, changing names over the years a few times. The old coal mining town is now known as Sego and has officially been a ghost town since 1955. Sego is one of those places that truly tried to survive! There are many partial buildings and foundations still standing. It was a fun place to explore and wonder what it was like at its peak when the town supported 500 people!
We spent some time in the Moab area in 2015 visiting Arches & Canyonlands NP, but we did not visit Dead Horse Point State Park located between the two. Thompson Springs is about an hour from Dead Horse, which was the main reason for our stop. The Moab area is very crowded and expensive in June (their busiest season). Thompson Springs is very peaceful.
The muddy Colorado River lies 2000’ below the point in Dead Horse Point State Park and runs through Shafer Basin. There is a 32 mile dirt road thru the basin between Canyonlands NP and Moab. A vehicle can be seen in the lower left corner of the photo on the right.
Below are some of the gorgeous wildflowers that were blooming in the park.
There are several Solar Evaporation Ponds in one part of the basin. I’m including a picture of a sign explaining them.
This is zoomed in on the La Sal Mountains. They are seen in the background of the evaporation ponds in the photo above. On our first visit to Moab, we drove up them.
