Leaving the state of Nevada today and heading back to Utah to visit Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks. These are two parks that neither Scott nor I have visited- and both are very well known parks for their beauty and hiking! We are so excited to visit these parks.

 

Our original campsite for our time here was cancelled on us just yesterday, so we had some scrambling to do today to find a campsite. We arrived at one of the Dixie National Forest visitor centers in Red Canyon where we spoke to a worker and she gave us some spots to check for camping. We ended up at Kings Creek campground, right next to the Tropic Reservoir. The road to get to the campground is about 7 miles of rough gravel road and goes through a couple of open range cattle areas. Nevertheless, we were lucky to have found a campsite and be able to breathe a small sigh of relief.

 

Once we parked the camper, we headed into Bryce Canyon. Our goal for the day was to drive to the furthest point on the road (Rainbow Point) and make our way down to where the shuttle ends. We got out at Rainbow Point and hiked the Bristlecone Trail. This trail was a little disappointing after hiking the Bristlecone trail in Great Basin, but it was at least a nice little hike to stretch our legs.

 

The majority of the road we were driving was a “pull over and look” area, so we stopped at plenty of overlooks. The overlooks we stopped at included Black Birch Canyon, Agua Canyon, Natural Bridge, Farview Point, and Piracy Point. Each of these had varying lengths of walks to get to the views. Piracy Point was a little disappointing because there was no sign explaining the name (Scott was not happy!) 🙂

 

After finishing the upper portion of the drive, we headed to the visitor center to look around (couldn’t go inside, but looked really neat from the outside!), then headed back to the camper for dinner and a fire 🙂

 

The next morning, we headed back to Bryce Canyon after getting a slightly later start than planned. We parked at the Shuttle Stop outside the park, and took the shuttle into the park. We wanted to shuttle to avoid the crowds and dealing with parking at Sunset/Sunrise Point, which are the busiest areas at Bryce. We took the shuttle to Sunset Point after talking with the ranger on the bus (either way, you have a really steep hike, but starting at Sunset has the steeper part going down, rather than up).

We were so excited when we saw that there was a ranger talk starting shortly! We have been deprived this trip of learning from rangers about the parks. Ranger Taryn gave us a geology talk and explained all about hoodoos (Bryce Canyon has the most hoodoos in one area in the world!). She also talked about the layers of rock and how they were formed from an old lake that went through periods of high and low waters.

 

After the ranger talk, we hiked down into the canyon! We took the Navajo Loop trail down into the canyon and connected to the Queens Garden Loop that took us through to Sunrise Point. The canyon is seriously gorgeous- I’ve never seen such colors! There were also trees that were growing a hundred feet tall from the canyon floor- so pretty! Words cannot accurately describe the beauty of everything we saw, so check out these pictures!

 

Once we hiked out of the canyon at Sunrise Point, we took the Rim Trail back to Sunset Point (only about a 1/2 mile). We found a place to sit and ate some lunch! After lunch, we decided to hike to Inspiration Point. Here is where we made our grave error in judgment. This hike was only .7 miles long, but we were starting a lot lower than Inspiration Point. Still, the Rim Trail was beautiful and we kept getting to see those beautiful views of the canyon!

 

From Inspiration Point, we again decided to hike uphill to get to Bryce Point. Bryce Point boasts the best views of the park and is probably what we have seen the most pictures of. This hike was 1.3 miles and again, uphill 🙂 Scott and I agree that making ourselves do things like this is why we will live to 100 years old! Bryce Point did not disappoint, and the views were spectacular! We also got a chance to talk to a couple who gave us some insider info about Zion, which was perfect because we were heading there the next day.

 

After taking in our last views of Bryce Canyon, we walked down to the shuttle and took it all the way down to the shuttle stop outside the park. Our bus driver was awesome! She gave us cool information about things we saw in the park that we didn’t know before (like how the old looking gas station has pumps that are stuck on 20 cents a gallon from when they were last used!).

We got back in the truck and drove to Mossy Cave. This is a short hike along the scenic Route 12 through the park. It was really busy with people. We realized afterwards that the Tropic River flows through this part of the park, and many people bring their kids to swim in the little waterfall area. The Mossy Cave was neat to look at, and I loved looking at the river! Scott wants me to make sure I tell everyone that it is actually the Tropic Ditch, and it was dug out to direct water where the people wanted it 🙂

 

We thoroughly enjoyed our time in Bryce Canyon. As I said before, words can’t really describe how beautiful it is out there. This is a part of the country that everyone should see at some point! Tomorrow, we will be visiting Zion National Park!