Welcome back to my blog! I’m recapping our trip across the country, in our camper. We are now at Days 8 & 9. Here’s the totals that we traveled for the whole trip:
Bryce Canyon: Colorful, artistic, cozy
- Miles hiked: 12
After a long day of driving from Yellowstone park, we arrived in Bryce Canyon Utah. Once again, I didn’t know a thing about this park before we arrived. Wait, I did know one thing, I wanted to go on the Najavo trail. I saw a picture of it in my travel book, and it looked incredible. Bryce is a much smaller park than Yellowstone. We had one full day in Bryce and I think that was the right amount of time to see what we wanted to see. We didn’t feel rushed either.
I convinced my family (read: demanded) to see the sunrise at Bryce Canyon. That meant getting up at 5am. That’s a hefty order when we’ve had all of that traveling, but we did it. Luckily we were only 7 minutes from the park. We were not the only ones there either.
This is what I was hoping to see…. (NOT my picture….)
This is what I saw. Kinda different.
At this point I was feeling a little silly for getting everyone out of bed so early for the sunrise. As it turns out, my family members are not morning people like me! Must be the photography skills, right? And the day, and the weather….
We took some good pictures. Note our winter coats? It was cold in the morning!
After all of the excitement of the sunrise, we were ready to start our day. And it was only 7am! At least we got to take a super early hike while it was still “cooler” at the park. 4 miles to start our day on the trails.
The colors in the canyon were amazing!
Mid day now… time for a long hike. 8 miles!
All of the trails go down into the canyon, so the last part of the hike is all uphill. Phew, that is challenging!
Not to mention the trails were dusty. Super dusty!
On our second hike of the day we had lunch down in the canyon. Beautiful surroundings!
See all of those pointy formations? They are called Hoodoos.
This is called Wall Street.
This is Thors Hammer.
Funny how we had just been in a park where it was so much cooler, and now it was near 90 degrees. It is true what they say about “dry heat”. Even though it was 90, it was comfortable.
Since we got up so early, we went back to the campground and the adults took naps. Ahhhhh. The kids? They were always ready to get moving!
After dinner we saw the sunset. Nice, but still not that super colorful shot!
Overall though, the colors of this park did not disappoint. I have never seen anything like this before! I also think the campground we stayed at was our favorite private campground of the trip. It was Ruby’s Inn. Very friendly and helpful employees, with a wide range of services.
Day 9 involved some good old fashion adulting… doing the laundry! I had to mention this because I haven’t been to a laundromat in about 20 years I think. I had to ask one of the campers how it all worked. LOL! After laundry, it was back on the road. Next stop: Zion National Park (Utah)! It was supposed to be only 1 1/4 hours drive to Zion, but you know, that turned out to be closer to 4 hours later!
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Q: Have you ever been to Bryce Canyon?
Q: When’s the last time you’ve been to a laundromat?
When Alan and I lived together in an apartment (in the “good old days” haha!), we used to go to a place called Suds and Duds. You could get a beer while you waited for the wash! Of course we always went around midnight when the dryers were free!! Yes, we have always lived a thrifty life 🙂
I can’t wait to go to Bryce Canyon someday! Did you see any snakes? We have a laundromat right by our house that we dry our comforter at because it doesn’t fit in our dryer. Every time I go, I feel so thankful to have my own washer and dryer. It is so much harder and time consuming for families to do laundry if they have to go to a laundromat. Could you imagine!?
I think the only wildlife we saw at Bryce was a very tame chipmunk. We hand feed it a flower. 🙂 That would have been really cool to see a snake. We love them! A scorpion would have freaked me out though. Ewwwww!