Bryce Canyon National Park

June 4 - June 11, 2013

It took me a while to warm up to this park. After really loving both Grand Canyon and Zion, Bryce just wasn't measuring up. It's a canyon, but nowhere as big or impressive as Grand Canyon. It's got pretty red rocks, but they're not as pretty or impressive as Zion. What makes it unique is something called "hoodoos" and I just wasn't feeling the hoodoos. But a couple of days into our stay we hiked down into the canyon and saw the hoodoos up close and personal. And that's when I started to warm up to Bryce.

SiSi  didn't care much about the hoodoos either

A hoodoo is an oddly-shaped rock formation created from millions of years of wind and water erosion. More interesting is the Paiute Indian legend that holds that these rocks were once evil people who were turned to stone by the Coyote spirit.  Here's a few snapshots of the park and some hoodoos.

The "amphitheater" taken from the canyon rim

This hoodoo is known as Thor's hammer

The fact that the canyon wasn't as overwhelmingly immense as Grand Canyon, and the fact that the rocks aren't as large as the rocks at Zion ended up making Bryce all the more accessible. All of the next group of photos were taken on our hike to the floor of the canyon, something I never would have dreamed of doing at Grand Canyon.

 

This shows the loooong hike we had back to the top. If you click on the picture you can enlarge it and see all the hikers on the switchbacks on their way to the top.

 

 

 

So far on this trip we have visited four national parks, not including monuments, historical parks, and presidential libraries. We have seen quite a bit of wildlife, including mule deer, pronghorn antelopes, elk, big horned sheep, and buffalo. But, by far, my favorite sighting was these three baby chipmunks. Betty, are they chipmunks or ground squirrels?

On June 6th we let ourselves get talked into attending a "western show and chuck wagon dinner" at a place called Ebenezer's Barn and Grill. It turned out to be one of the highlights of our trip! The food was quite good (my grilled salmon was amazing) and the entertainment was top notch. We were treated to a funny and quite professional performance by the "Bar-G Wranglers." They sung a wonderful collection of old western tunes and crowd favorites. While the audience was being seated the servers nonchalantly asked everyone where they were from. The crowd was quite international. Later, one of the singers asked folks from each different country represented to stand and cheer when he called out their country, and waved their flag. There was a big contingent from France, and they made a lot of noise when their flag was waved. The US was called last and the French all booed! We were stunned! Quick on his feet, the singer said "are you really booing the US on D-Day? Really?" That shut them up!


The Bar-G Wranglers

On another evening we attended the local county rodeo. It was fun! Unfortunately, this was the only picture we were able to take before the camera's battery died.