Sunday, 8/26
Finally the scenic
drive just down the road from our Fruita campsite was open again (after being closed for 2 days due to rain and flash
flooding) and we toured about 10 miles of it at sunrise this morning. GORGEOUS!
The light wasn't really the best for photos but here are a few anyway…
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| "The Chimney" |
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| The colors are much more vibrant in real life, red brown, greenish blue and white |
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| Diagonal stripes---very modern looking |
Temps in the low 60s,
sunny, beautiful puffy clouds. Then we
hitched up the RV for the drive to Bryce Canyon.
We traveled through Dixie National Forest (I have to research why there's a Dixie anything so far from the Mason-Dixon line) and then the Grand
Staircase-Escalante National Monument.
Very scenic, LONG vistas that just went on for miles and miles, of
mountains and desolate sandy-looking desert.
We passed roads to Box-Death Hollow and Hells Back Bone along the way
(they're both on the Utah map if you don't believe me). Felt a little like being in a moonscape, or the bottom of the ocean.....so interesting to look at, but you'd die of exposure in about 12 minutes. Speaking of Death, we narrowly avoided it
many, many times. As much as a 14% grade up and
down and winding around narrow roads with no guard rails and the sheerest drop=offs on
either side. I got vertigo just looking
down out of my window. Nils was too busy
trying to stay on the road to look down, or sideways or anything else. It was stressful, to say the least. But GORGEOUS!!! Wow, what incredible scenery. There was a literal wall of mountains that
stretched for miles and miles and miles.
Supposedly there's a "hole in the rock" to which and then through which intrepid
Mormon settlers managed to climb and slip and slide with their horses
and wagons. The Ute Indians didn't
believe that it was possible and thought the Mormons were just liars with
Pantalones del Fuego. But they did
it. The town of Escalante was obviously
Mormon...the main drag was at least 6 lanes wide! The woman ahead of us at the gas station had
ridden her lawn mower to the station for a fill-up. That's how busy the street was on this lazy
Sunday morning. Beautiful irrigated
green fields, horses and cows.
We arrived at Bryce
Canyon at 11:30am and quickly found a camping site. Then took off for a little sightseeing drive
to the major lookouts. Wow!
PHOTOS 24, 31 42
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| It looks even more orange in real life |
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| Doesn't this look like masses of cathedrals with weird flying buttresses? |
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| That's svelter Lisa in the foreground, Hoodoos in the background (and the Escalante/Grand Staircase in the WAY background) |
It's an even deeper
orange than in the photos. Just
spectacular. We got to the visitor's
center just as the skies opened up.
Thunder! Lightning! Hail, even!
Temps dropped about 15 degrees within 25 minutes. And then it was over. According to everyone, this happens most
afternoons. We came home, started a
puzzle and then decided we had do at least an easy hike between Sunrise and
Sunset Points (about a mile). BUT we
were mesmerized by the series of endless switchbacks down and down and down,
and couldn't resist following the other hikers about 700 feet down to the floor
of the canyon. MAGICAL. Also strenuous. It felt like being in an ancient Moorish
mountain=side village. Everything was
orange, with narrow winding paths, walls and doorways all with the feel of
unfired clay. It was like a walking a
labyrinth in a sacred space.
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| That's Thor's Hammer to the left and the Three Ladies slightly behind and to the right |
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| We switchbacked all the way down to the bottom, where the people look like ants. |
Wow! It was hard work climbing all the way back up
again and totally worth it. Can't wait
for our hike tomorrow morning!
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