After our short adventure at the Great Basin National Park, we made our way to Bryce Canyon. We arrived there in time to see the sunset. We would stay here 2 nights and were glad to have some extra time this year to explore the lodge and surrounding. After our hike tomorrow, we planned have time to drive the 18 miles scenic drive with lots of overlooks of the canyon, and check out the visitors center, etc. 🙂
The canyon is a spectacular sight! Such beautiful colors, contrasts and formations.
We looked down on the trails that we would hike tomorrow. We were hoping to cover more miles than we did last year, and spend more time enjoying the trails and being down among the hoodoos. That is what the spires of rock are called.
We checked out the lodge, which was built in 1925. It is really cool! We stopped in the gift shop and bought a couple of walking sticks for Kenny. We were hoping that his knee would be able to cover some good trail mileage without much pain!
The interior of the lodge is pretty small and unassuming compared to the lodges that we saw at Glacier National Park.
We weren’t able to get reservations to stay here, although it would have been a treat. We stayed just a couple of miles from the park entrance, which was convenient and offered more variety for dining options.
We got up in the morning ready to hit the trail. It was a little cool, which was fantastic for hiking. Mostly blue sky, and temperatures starting out in the 50’s.
We started down into the canyon on Queens Garden Trail, and connected to Navajo Loop, as we did last year. I think these are the queens.
Kenny’s knee was doing ok, and he really wanted to continue, so we connected to the Peekaboo Loop trail.
We didn’t see many critters, but this little guy did let me take his portrait.
The trail is carved through some interesting places, including a few tunnels. If you look close to the left of the key hole, you’ll see Kenny patiently waiting for the photographer to catch up.
This is the thing we love about Bryce Canyon. It is “small” enough (compared to the Grand Canyon), that you can capture pictures and be in and among the scenery without being swallowed up. Your eyes can grasp the size and enjoy the formations without being overwhelmed beyond your peripheral field of vision.
And the colors were brilliant! Pictures just don’t capture the unique majesty of this place!
We only did one half of the Peekaboo loop, because we intersected with it at the bottom. This photo (below) looks across to see arches, with various colors of rock and dirt. The half of Peekaboo Loop that we didn’t do runs along the bottom through the lower hoodoos.
Even still, you can feel pretty small and insignificant among the grandeur.
The biggest problem Kenny’s knee has is in going downhill, which we did first thing in the morning. That’s why he thought he’d be good to keep going. However, the Peekaboo Loop trail had several uppy-downys along with its ziggy-zaggys. So we would stop frequently, catch our breath, and he would stretch. We’d been told it is his “I-T band” giving him all the trouble. So some lateral stretching did seem to help. The far ridge in this shot shows our destination. WHAT?!?
And.. we did it! This is near the top, looking back down the zig-zag white in the foreground then the winding trail going waaay over there turning to orange and going down, down, down (…to the ring of fire?… Just a little Johnny Cash humor there).
This really doesn’t look all that impressive, but it took us a good 4 hours to cover the 4.3 miles, with 1:38 moving time! HA! The white line at the bottom shows the changes in elevation – some of the uppy-downy in the middle of the hike, then UP farther to get out than we originally went down.!
Bryce Canyon National Park was running shuttle buses from various stops, which was a wonderful way to encourage and facilitate one-way hikes! We came out of the canyon at a popular spot and this was one of the stops. So we hopped a shuttle for a ride back to our car. Then we drove around and enjoyed even more scenery. It was a beautiful day, a fantastic hike, and we slept really good that night!
