Spent 4-5 hours this morning heading to Bryce Canyon from Provo. Just before Bryce, however, we came across Red Canyon – amazing to see as well, more to follow on that.
In order to check into our room for the night, we had to drive past the exit to Bryce Canyon and head into a town called Tropic. This turned out to be about 30 minutes outside the park, which wasn’t too bad all things considered. So we checked into our room at “Bryce Canyon Country Cabins”, but our room wasn’t a cabin. It was in the “Nostalgic Building” i.e. old house on the property that was split up into 3 suites. Still, clean and cozy, and we didn’t have to share a bathroom – it was all good.
Went across the street for some food (the local and from what it looks like the only restaurant in Tropic) and then drove to Bryce Canyon. The park is about 18 miles top to bottom, so nowhere near Yellowstone sized. This was good, since we really only had about 3/4 of a day to see it (plus maybe something at sunrise tomorrow). We followed the brochure’s suggestion of starting at the bottom of the park (southernmost point) and then heading back. We took in every major point along the way with the exception of Bryce Point, Sunset Point and Sunrise Point which we decided to hit at sunrise tomorrow – that’ll be interesting.
The park/canyon is, in a word, spectacular. It’s everything we hoped it would be sights-wise, and more. For example, here is a shot from Inspiration Point:
And here’s another showing the Natural Bridge:
Many pictures taken, hopefully a lot of them will end up on Flickr.
After stopping at all the points we had planned to, we drove back to Red Canyon (remember above?) and had a small picnic at the Visitor Centre (peanut butter sandwiches, we spared no expense). We had heard that Red Canyon was great at sunset, so we hung out and waited for the magic light:
All in all an amazing experience for the day. Next we get up at 5:30am to be at Bryce Point for sunrise – hope that goes well. Afterwards, we drive to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and check in sometime in the afternoon to head to the Canyon for some pics.
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