July 11, 2013 Day two

Mesquite NV, Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon National Park

Morning came early, as we needed to change time zones coming into Utah.  First drive of the day was through the Virgin River Gorge in the upper corner of Arizona.  A lovely drive that was carved out through the canyon.  The morning sun made for interesting light on the cliffs and gorge walls.

Then we drove about an hour to the first of all National Parks on this trip.

By the way, did you know that once you turn 62 you can get a lifetime Senior Pass for all of the National Parks for $10, and never have to pay an entrance. Fee again (which is often $10-$25 per park.)  The best deal in the country.  And not only the pass holder, but also other passengers in the car get in free.  Run right down and get your pass if you are old enough. If you are not 62 yet, you can get the pass for about $80/year, still a deal if you go to several parks in a year.  Just today only, we saved $50 on entrance fees, as well as getting camping at half price, so saved another $7.50.  Yah, thrifty travelers!

Back to Zion.  Temperatures were hot, getting up to the lower 90’s degrees by afternoon.  We spent the morning there in the “cooler” temps, only in the mid 80’s.  This is a very busy park with 2.5 million visitors a year.  We had to park at a great visitor’s center and then take a tram into the canyon.  Lovely, lovely red rocks and cliffs.  It wasn’t as hot as it often is, because just as we were getting ready to leave, it began to rain.  We heard from rangers that there were flash flood warnings out, including in a trail areas where the canyon becomes very narrow.  Despite this warning, there were tons of families taking small children onto these trails.  We wished them well, but it looked like not a very good idea to us.  Plus, even if you didn’t get caught in a flood, the train was pretty intense.  We were happy to get into the tram and then in our car to leave the park.

Then an hour and half drive to Bryce Canyon National Park.  Higher in elevation, so cooler, in the 70’s.  Much of the drive was in pretty hard rain, and as we came into Bryce Canyon Park, we saw a solid stream of visitors leaving.  We had no trouble getting a campsite (in the pouring rain) and settled in for a nice midafternoon nap listening to the sound of the rain on the roof our van.

We had hoped that it would stop raining for us to go on a ranger walk, but it still rained on and off and so no ranger.  We did the scenic driving loop around the Canyon.  This is such a different type of canyon than The Grand Canyon.  The most interesting features are known as Hoodoos, and were said to be” legendary ancient people” by the Paiute Indians whose land this was.  Their stories say these people were changed into rocks by coyote (that trickster is always up to something). These sculptures and balancing rocks were in the strangest shapes.  And because of the rain, the colors were especially vivid.  What a wonderful drive.  And we did a bit of hiking down in the canyon, too.  The red mud collected on our shoes making our feet heavier and heavier as we hiked.  Patti was so glad that she got new trail shoes for the trip….guess they are broken in now.  But, we had a hopeful sign, a beautiful rainbow.

One of the themes we are picking up on this trip is astronomy and seeing stars.  We were pleased that we were able to catch a talk by a NASA Ambassador on the latest in stars and planetary exploration.  We had hoped to be able to take part in looking at the sky with telescopes, but the rain was back, so that part was cancelled.   When we got up in the night, we could see that the skies here are so dark.  So little of the city light pollution.  Beautiful to soak in the stars.

And finally to sleep.

Quote for the day:  “A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.” – John Steinbeck