Despite overcrowding, Utah's Moab still is a beautiful place fo...

Live long enough, travel enough, and sure enough, one day you will return to a favorite destination to find it overcrowded, overcommercialized and unable to regenerate itself.

[johnnyonedog]

What comes next for those few that are pigs are fees to ride in order to keep the place clean.

[ffelix]

This guy doesn't seem to understand what Moab is about. Hint: it's not the town.

Moab is one of a very few, very rare, very special places where you can actually find true, unregulated, unpackaged adventure as big as your ingenuity, fortitude & imagination can make it.

Who cares if there are crappy t-shirt shops on the main drag & the chlorinated water park is closed? Moab is windy & there are a lot of idiot punters. Don't whine about it--if you see trash, then just pick it up like the locals do.

The reason the impassioned are drawn to this place is to be outside, in a challenging, primal, spectacular, even dangerous environment, not in a crappy, safe, brain-dead mall like everywhere else in this country. The town is just for recovering before throwing yourself back out there again as fast as you can manage.

Take the kids to a real water park next time: the Colorado River system. Cook your own dinner over a firepan of fragrant pinon coals. Go hunt for wildflowers, views, petroglyphs, dinosaur tracks, minerals &/or fossils rather than for a thrilling shopping experience. Sleep under the staggering, sage-scented desert stars rather than behind a billboard in one of JJ's poisonous air-conditioned box hotels.

This kind of experience may not be for everyone. The author probably needs to go to Disneyland instead since he seems to want someone to tell him what to do rather than challenging himself.

[MoabJim]

We are so sorry to hear that you had such a depressing experience in Moab recently. I guess it proves that the Law of Attraction still works. If you are attracted to trash in parking lots and like to get flipped off, you probably will.

If you would like an alternate to your poor experience and some words about E. Abbey, please see the following articles I have written about Moab and Abbey in the past couple of years. Here are the links: http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... , http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... .

By the way, you missed the story of the century. I wrote about it at http://www.jamesmcgillis.com/default.asp... .

Cheers,

Jim McGillis (Moab Jim)

[Johanthan Mosher]

Garbage?
Kids Drinking beer?
Advertising?
Expensive restaurants?
EVERY CITY HAS THESE!!!!

I was born in Moab. I have lived here off and on most of my life.

This town is VERY beautiful.
This town is NOT over crouded.(there is actually a shortage of low-income housing)

Is that all writers do these days is complain?

[Johanthan Mosher]

agree

[EASY RIDER]

road thru moab couple of years back...was a very bueatiful and relaxing place.

[exmex]

Reading an article from a travel writer from the Denver Post about Moab Utah, and believing a word in it, is akin to reading the National Enquirer and believing EVERY word of it. Mr. Wagner is not only ignorant but he obviously has motives beyond the scope of educating people about traveling to Moab.
He is in fact a poor "writer" and an even poorer "travel journalist".

Every visitors & convention bureau in this country is scrambling right now to drum up tourist business and giving "travel writers" all kinds of perks to write favorable stories about their towns. Check out the link below to see where "Mr. travel writer's" vested interests LIE!!
http://guide.denverpost.com/authors/kwagner/