Part Deux: Anniversary at Bryce Canyon

Back for more, eh?
Bryce Canyon National Park is such a beautiful and interesting place, why wouldn't you be back!?
Inspiration Point leads to a view overlooking Bryce Amphitheater, the picture you see on most Bryce Canyon maps or booklets. It's pretty awesome! The trail to view this incredible feature is quite steep but short. I had to put my knee brace on for this one.
Inspiration Point at 8,100 ft. 

After Inspiration Point, we were both getting to the point where we wanted to do a short hike and call it a day. We looked at the map and saw there was a 1/4 mile hike (just my style), where you walk stream-side to a waterfall. The point is called Mossy Cave and although on the map says it's a part of the park, you actually cannot access it from the park. We figured at this point Mossy Cave would be our finale for the day, so we hopped on the bike and drove the 7-8 miles to our destination.

This was definitely my favorite part of the entire day. Instead of looking down on and walking "on top" of the hoodoos, we were on a trail under the hoodoos! We had a whole different view point from underneath, it was just so cool and whoa, what a view! Plus, we were able to walk beside a beautiful fast flowing stream...something we haven't done this whole journey.

The trail led to a fork where you could turn left to go to the cave or turn right to go towards the waterfall...we turned right!

We hiked up that trail!!!

After checking out the waterfall and hiking up this super steep & scary hill, we decided to go back the other way to see the cave. It wasn't much of a walk but it was a little bit of a climb, the trail just angles up.

We were expecting a much larger cave...but there was moss in it!

We were having more fun at the waterfall, so we went back to play in the water.

And of course had to get in that waterfall somehow...even if it felt like a million of the strongest hands slapping you down to the bottom of Earth! 

Sizing it up

Feeling that energy

Success!!

I didn't have the right shoes (yes, again) AND I had both cameras so I didn't get under the actual fall, BUT I did go behind it...that was crazy! The sound of the water was deafening, you could definitely feel the force of it just being behind it.

Swan Dive

Best day everrrrrr!!!!

Happy 7 & 10 year anniversary to us!!

If you want to see a short video of our day, click the video below.

PEACE

Don't forget!!!

 Go to our YouTube channel

 to find out more about how to live a better life.

ENIGMATIC NOMADICS YOUTUBE CHANNEL

Like and Subscribe

Anniversary in Bryce Canyon National Park

It was a great time to be around Bryce Canyon National Park not only because the rain had stopped and the temperatures were still amazing but July is our "celebration month". We have both of our anniversaries (date & wedding) and both of our birthdays to celebrate. Usually we try to do something special (to us) like going out to eat at a restaurant or doing something we normally wouldn't do (due to saving money). Being around Bryce Canyon gave us both of these options. 

I researched on Yelp the couple of restaurants around Bryce Canyon City to see where we would go for a Lovers Lunch on our anniversary. It came down to Ruby's Inn or The Lodge inside of Bryce Canyon National Park, both have lunch buffets. The reviews on Yelp for Ruby's Inn weren't great, not that The Lodge was any better, but we figured it would be fun to eat inside of the park, then do some hikes & sightseeing afterward.  The Lodge has a lunch buffet for $14.15 per person, but is pretty limited; a very small salad bar, a soup or two and hot & cold deli styled sandwiches. After we ate, we thought we would have been better off ordering from the menu but we came for the experience and we were full, with a sandwich to spare, (I had bags in my backpack...hey, I paid for it).

After our Lovers Lunch we drove to the furthest point in the park, Rainbow Point. We figured we would work our way from the back of the park to the front, that way if we wanted to come back in we wouldn't have to drive so far. The drive from the entrance to Rainbow Point is about 18 miles.
I'm sure there are amazing lightning shows when it storms here, you could see for miles and miles and with the dark clouds looming over the mountains in the distance we could see why they called this Rainbow Point...I'm sure they're quite spectacular here.

If you've never been to Bryce Canyon or seen pictures, it's a very interesting place. It has hoodoos, spires, fins, canyons, windows, bridges, arches...it's like all the parks combined into one awesome sight. This was our first look at the incredible forces of nature that have taken place over thousands of years and it's simply breathtaking. I hope you enjoy the pictures, because there will be a lot of them!

Next on the map was Ponderosa Point at 8,904 feet.

Next up: Agua Canyon at 8,800 feet.

Working our way down to the next point was Black Birch Canyon at 8,750 feet.

We did a lot more sightseeing than hikes, so most of our time was spent driving from one overlook to another. We still had a great day though, there is so much to take in at Bryce Canyon.
I feel like I should have some kind of explanation for the pictures but I feel the pictures do themselves enough justice...so excuse me for not writing more in this blog post, I just thought you'd like to see lots of great pictures instead of me blabbing away. 
So here are more view points we were able to see...

Here you will see Natural Bridge, even though technically an Arch

I will do a part two to this post next. There was just way too much great stuff to see and lots of pictures were taken so I've got to do more digging to get the best shots for you!!

'til next time...
PEACE

Testing testing....1..2..3..

One more test just for the fun of it!!!

Hope you're getting these super fun emails!

 

Days of Thunder

We were both pretty excited about being back at Bryce Canyon. The temperatures were nice during the day and for sleeping, we found a really nice private spot where you had to come down into our camp to see us and there were deer and Pronghorn around us all the time. 

The thing we weren't expecting was rain...days and days of rain. Probably should have looked a little better at that weather forecast!

Sometimes rain is welcome but when we get hours of heavy downpours or days of it, it gets a little annoying for many reasons, but mostly because you can't get out of the van and that makes your body ache and your mind turn into mush from all of the computer time. The other reason I don't dig the rain so much, living in the van, is dog potty time; they don't want to go out in it, neither do I but they won't go without a potty partner (me) and their feet and bellies get muddy. Maybe if we had a bigger rig, rainy days would be cozy and kind of cool, but in the van, they're the pits.

Anyway, we looked at the weather forecast the day after we arrived and saw it would probably rain for 2-3 days...it rained on and off for 5 days. Since we mostly live outside of the van, that's a lot of stuff getting wet, muddy shoes and paws (even though we wipe them off as much as we can), a lot of sitting and not being able to stretch out, stand up or lay down (because of how our bed plan is). We can't get into any of our bins because they are covered with the tarp that's trying to keep them dry (but they fill up with water anyway) and at this spot we have no TV, so that leaves us way too much time with our computers and most of the stuff we want or have to do takes internet usage so our data slips by way too fast...
All in all, it's better when it's not raining!

When the Sun started shining with no clouds around, it was a spectacular day...we didn't know what to do with ourselves.

Once we had some dry days we started scoping out the forest around us. We could tell there had been a few forest fires around where we were parked as well as through the entire forest. I guess with the lightning storms and the tall trees it's inevitable but still sad to see... and smell.

 I always think about the animals that live here and where they go when such a thing happens, I guess some get out and some don't...Mother Nature lives on.

After 2 days of sunshine and LOTS of out of the van time, we had 2 more days of rain!
Today, we are praying to the Sun God to show it's purty face for the remainder of our stay.
PEACE

The Uintas?? Maybe...maybe not!

In my last post, I talked about heading up to the Uintas for some much needed cooler temperatures. It was the 4th of July weekend and even though we wouldn't be hanging out with our friends until after the weekend, we made sure to stock up really well before heading up there. The drive from Salt Lake City to the town of Kamas (the foot of the mountains) took about an hour & a half. 

We started up the mountain heading toward Soapstone Basin Road and immediately started seeing people everywhere, this was definitely not a secret spot! Once on Soapstone Basin Road it almost felt like we were in gridlock! There were people driving up the mountain, down the mountain, this side road, that side road, you name it, there were people on some type of toy (ATV, Razor, dirt bike) tow vehicle or rig. We figured we would just keep climbing, the higher we could get the better the temperatures...we also thought the higher we went less people would be able to get up there but this was not the solution in this case. The higher we got, the more people we saw...at one point we climbed up this big hill and as we popped over it, we saw what looked like a Big Rig festival; the most 5th wheels, Class A's and big F350 Ford trucks we've seen in one place. There were at least 30+ rigs in one camp, at the top of this hill...it was amazing to see! 

We knew most, if not all, of these people were here for the Holiday weekend and we would be here for at least 2 weeks, so we kept driving around looking for a spot. You can definitely see why so many people come up here if not for the great temperatures, it's gotta be for the scenery...it's gorgeous up there. We both were taken back by how many beautiful, colorful wildflowers there were in bloom. I know I had never seen anything like it; yellow and purple everywhere. 

We drove up this one kind of rough part of the road and Jamie parked to go scope what was over the hill, he came back to say it was all good. When he started Joon, nothing happened, she didn't start and didn't make any noise...hmmm? The van wouldn't start for a good 15 minutes and with so many people on the mountain, you bet we held up traffic going up and coming down. We were in the perfect spot to have nowhere to go, even if someone could have come and pulled us up...it almost felt like the perfect disaster! Jamie thought she might have been vapor locked from driving in the heat with the A/C on at the good points in the drive, then getting on those long steep mountain roads where you're pretty much crawling up the hills...the perfect recipe for a 20 year old van to say, "Alright, that's enough I need a break!" After resting for those 15 minutes or so, Jamie tried the turn of the key and she started right up! Yeehaw! We scouted a few more places before we found the only road with no one on it. We stopped for the night knowing in the morning we would drive around and try to find a place where our friends' Class C could get to, as well as an internet signal.

The spot we stayed in overnight was nice, but nowhere to really spread out and since we were tucked up in the woods, there were TONS of mosquitos. At one point Jamie looked over at the dogs and Savannah was covered head to tail with mosquitos, as I'm sure Chili was but it's harder to tell with her because she's black. We put them in the van right away and I could already see 3-4 welts on Savannah's head and a couple on Chili's ears...poor babies.

 The next morning we had brekkie and packed up. We were on a mission to: 1~Find a great spot 2~Find internet signal at that great spot and 3~Be able to get a Class C to that spot. We drove up & down, down & up, over here, over there, down the other side of the mountain taking us into the town of Francis. Since we drove to the Uintas and up to 10,000 feet elevation, from about 4,000, and all of the driving around yesterday, we had to stop and put another full tank of gas in the van (wasn't expecting that). Up the mountain we go again, this time from Francis instead of Kamas but it took us right back to where we started yesterday. We decided to take a drive up the mountain on asphalt instead of Soapstone Basin Roads gravel road. We drove a good 15-20 miles, all the way to the very top of Bald Mountain, about 11,000 feet! We stopped at two of the many many lakes up there, too...people people people everywhere!

 The weather was absolutely perfect up there, actually a little chilly but NO cell signal, NO internet...so back down the mountain we go. At this point, we were both getting a little frustrated finding ourselves back in Francis, we had about a half tank of gas now, after just filling up. We parked and had a good, long conversation about what we were going to do. Long story long, we decided to go back to Bryce Canyon. We called our friends, that were still two days away from being able to break away from their business in Salt Lake City, and told them what you just read (in a much shorter version, aren't you lucky).  The decision was made.
We were a little sad to leave under these circumstances but we had a great 3 week fun fest together, now it was time for us to head back to Bryce Canyon to finish our Mighty 5 journey. The drive we took from the Uintas to I-15 was probably one of the most magical, beautiful drives we've ever taken. The road takes you by the Jordanelle Dam and some rivers and lakes. 

People were tubing down the river along with everyone and their brother on some kind of aquatic toy; motorboats, jet skis, sailboats, skiing or tubing behind the boats. There were people everywhere! It all looked like a blast! 

As we drove, we saw waterfalls on the lush mountainsides and those mountains are so green and big and beautiful. That road, I think it was U-40, led us into the cute, quaint town of Provo. 

Provo was going to have a parade later that day and by the looks of it, were pretty pumped about it! Provo was pretty darn prepared for this parade and proud of it. Everyone set up their spot super early in the day, maybe even the day before. We saw folding chairs, arm chairs, gravity chairs, blankets, sleeping bags, tables, tents (big & small), even groups of couches were set up like an outdoor living room...and this went on for many miles. Very proud town of their parades. 

After all of the beauty and excitement we had to get on boring I-15 for several hours...not our fave but it had to be done.
We got to the same area we left 3 weeks before, to go to Salt Lake, around 7:30 p.m. and found an even better place to camp with much more privacy. 

The weather was absolutely perfect, in the high 60's...we couldn't have planned that part any better! We'll probably have to stick around the Bryce Canyon area for the rest of the month due to how much gas money we spent looking for a spot. We spent two months of gas (for our budget) in two days, so we'll be sitting for a while, hope it stays nice!
All in all, it kind of stunk to not be able to hang in the beautiful Uintas with our friends but we made the best decision, for ourselves, and sometimes that's just what ya gotta do. 

PEACE