Capital Reef State Park

Yesterday, we travelled from Bryce Canyon State Park to just outside Capital Reef State Park.  It was a 113 mile trek and for up hills and down hills, it was the worse one yet.  I’m talking major climbs and downgrades.  According to the Mountain Directory West, they were classified as pretty tough ones.  I followed behind Ken in the rig.  It was a very beautiful drive, but didn’t get much of a chance to admire the view.  The roads were twisty, curvy so had to keep my eyes on the road. 
The campground we’re is pretty nice, we have trees which is nice and full hook-ups even though it’s only 30 amp.  But because the temperature is moderate there isn’t a need to have both A/C’s running full blast.
Today we drove over to Capital Reef State Park and as you will see from the pictures, again, awesome.  We hiked up a ‘wash’ click here for explanation for about 1/2 a mile or so.  It was warmer there than at our campground.  Very dry, hot and sunny.  You don’t want to forget your water when you go there.  When you stop and listen the silence is, as they say, deafening.  You can hear the wind.  Peaceful, beautiful.
Tomorrow we head for Goblin Park.  There is nothing there, no hook-ups, no water, sewer, electricity.  So we have to use the rigs resources tomorrow.  We are just there overnight.  I don’t know if I can get a connection with my Verizon stick.

Until later then…take care.

More Bryce Canyon

Today we went on our own up to these 4 different lookout points.  Sunrise Point, Sunset Point,  Inspiration Point and Bryce Point.  It was amazing, wish I could come up with some other adjectives to describe it.  Amazing, spectacular, awesome, breathtaking, wonderful, candy for the eyes.  It’s a part of the canyon they all the amphitheatre.  We hiked quite a distance today, probably about 3 miles.  Walked on a path along the edge of the cliff.  It’s perfectly safe IF you stay on the path.  Where do you point the camera?  And without seeing it in person I’m sure all the pictures look the same.
We ended up at the Bryce Canyon Lodge which has a gift shop, of course, so I did a little shopping.  The have beautiful native Indian things, but very expensive. 
They were doing what they call a ‘controlled burn’ we noticed on the way up to the canyon.  By the time we got back, it looked like a forest fire to me, but it was still this ‘controlled burn’.  They had traffic stopped, just going one way.  Lots of smoke and as we passed it lots of flame. But they seemed to know what they were doing.  It’s only a few miles up the road and it’s a little windy today and we are downwind so you can smell smoke and actually the air is smokey.  Gets to the eyes after awhile. 

Got back to the RV just after lunch so made some lunch and relaxed for the rest of the day.  Had a little nap, something I never do, but I was pooped.  Ken read his book.  Tonight there is a supper at a restaurant here on the property.  They have a huge buffet that looked really good, so we’re all meeting there for 6 PM.  Tomorrow we’re off to Torrey Utah.  It’s an arduous ride.  Big climb up, big grades down.  I think it’s the worse one of the trip.
Now this park claims to have high speed internet and maybe it does when you’re sitting right beside an access point, but we’re a little ways away.  It’s a huge park and they need more than 2 access points.  It’s most annoying.  This next place also claims to have internet, but I’m becoming doubtful of that statement.  We’ll see.  Thank goodness for my Verizon stick.

Well I’ll sign off for now…until later..take care.

A Horsey Day

Today all of us went horse back riding to the bottom of Bryce Canyon.  Our guide said that we went down to 7000 feet from 8000 feet.  It was quite a ride.  Some parts heading down and consequently coming back up were a little hair raising.  Little trail, big horse, long drop over the edge.  Yikes !!! You get the picture.   And for some reason the mules liked to walk near the edge.  The guide said, ‘Don’t worry, they’re not suicidal’ .. That really made me feel good.  99% of the critters were mules, but I had a horse.  Hatchet was the name of my horse.  We all form a train and head on down.  Gosh, I haven’t been on a horse’s back in 25 years.  It was a 2 hour ride.  Thought I’d be really sore but not too bad, maybe tomorrow I’ll eat those words.

1600 year old tree

Bryce Canyon

I am having difficulties with getting internet connections.  There is one here at this new campground but it just keeps dropping me.  I used my Verizon stick to post the last blog but don’t like to do that as it uses up all my bytes.  There’s a hotspot over a bit so will try and upload this one there.  If you don’t see a blog for a few days, it’s because I can’t get it uploaded.  I write them and as soon as I can upload they will be there.  May get a few at a time.

We had to get up early yesterday morning and be on the road by 8AM.  I hate those early starts.  It wasn’t a difficult drive, quite pretty.  I drove again though as we don’t want to stress the rig, but the hills were ok this time.  Next move there’s a doozie up and one down too.  12% grade up, and that’s pretty steep, and a 8% down and that also is steep.  So I’ll be driving again.

I have been having a really battle with Jackson eating Arthur’s food.  He didn’t touch it at first, I supposed because he didn’t realize that he could break down the barrier I put up and get at it.  Since he discovered that he could break down the barrier, every time we go out and leave them, he eats Arthur’s food.  Have strengthened the barrier, nope, he gets it down.  I think where food is concerned, nothing can hold him back.  So now poor Arthur will have no food down when we go out because I am going to have to put it up on the counter when we go out.  We are limited to the places that we can ‘hide’ his food in here.  And Jackson is determined.  So from now on, food comes up.

We arrived here at Bryce Canyon yesterday just about noon and we had a 1 PM tour that was scheduled for us.  So it was a mad rush to setup and get the dogs looked after and get to the bus on time.  We didn’t even get a chance to have lunch, so we had eaten breakfast at 6 AM and didn’t eat again until supper at about 6 PM.  The bus tour was really good, went up to 10,000 feet, what a view.  The pictures today are from that tour.  Today we are going horse back riding into the canyon.  All the caravan is going.  Should make for some really great pictures.  Tomorrow is a free day, so we are going back up to another spot as the view is supposed to be great.  Tomorrow night is a ‘cowboy dinner’.  Not sure what that entails, but I’m sure it will be good.
 

Until later…take care.

Grand Canyon – North Rim

We arrived here yesterday at Kaibab Campground, about 40 miles from the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.  Last night we had a kind of chili dog wiener roast, then you wrapped them in a tortilla, add various toppings like cheese, chili, hot sauce and roll it up and eat.  Actually it was very good.  Then we had smores for dessert.  This was all done around a huge campfire and put on our caravan leaders. 
The campground is out in the middle of the forest, under some large Ponderosa pines.  It’s very nice, dark and quiet at night.  We have full hook-ups, water, electricity, and sewer.  But there is no wifi here.  We do get satellite reception though.  Also do not get a signal on my cell phone.  My Verizon stick only shows 2 bars, sometimes 1, so internet is slow and I’m not going to upload this blog until tomorrow, where there is supposed to be internet.  We are at almost 8000 elevation so days are nice, nights are very cool.  Went down to 3 degrees C. last night.  Furnace was put on, let me tell you.

We left for the North Rim of the Grand Canyon about 9:30 this morning.  It’s a sight that is hard to put into words.  The North Rim is completely different than the south rim.  The south rim is the one is see in all the pictures and it’s where all the tourists go.  The North Rim is beautiful also, but different and hardly any tourists.  We are over 200 miles from the South Rim so we won’t be seeing it, this trip.  We walked around on some of the trails they have there, some, well you just don’t look down, just look straight ahead and keep walking.  We did alot of walking today.  Then we all met at the Lodge and had a excellent lunch.  After that some stayed, but we left to come back to the campground, there wasn’t much more to see and we wanted to get back for the dogs.  There are some mule rides you can take there that take you down into the canyon.  And some other trails that you could take.  But we were walked out as alot of the walking is downhill and of course that means uphill on the return.
                

Tomorrow we are off early to Bryce Canyon.

Until later then…take care.