Runaway Mouse

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If you have followed my blogs over the past years you will know that Beeny the Rabbit comes along with me... and perhaps you have seen a photo of the trusty rucksack with a little mouse dangling .. He was given to me by my dear friend Marilyn. Well sad to say but on Monday he must have decided that enough was enough and he was ready to retire from all this dangling and travelling and he escaped somehow whilst in Bryce Canyon - I have a theory that he was enticed away by those squirrels and is now happily frolicking in the trees .. I am glad he is wearing a little anorak as it gets snowy up there in winter. So goodbye mouse , you have been a good friend and I am happy for you.

It was Day 2 Road Trip and Suz and I hit the road after a good breakfast at the Galaxy Diner in Hatch ,drove on to Bryce and parked at Ruby's Inn where you can pick up the free shuttle bus into Bryce CanyonNP. We stayed on the bus to the final at Bryde Point stop and then started hiking round the Rim Trail. we ended up hiking right around to the Sunset and Sunrise Points. This part of the park is like an amphitheatre with these amazing hoodoo rock formations forming a huge bowl as you hike round the rim looking down at them.

The Paiute Native legend says that before they lived there there were the Legend People and some of them were bad so Coyote God turned them to stone and we can still see them today. And more recently Mr Ebeneener Bryce for whom the canyon is named said " it's a helluva place to lose a cow"

These rock formations are unique on the Earth , a combination of rock formations of Jurassic (200 million yr old ) to 20 Ma rocks of different types and the mountain building episodes which lifted the Colorado Plateau and caused stresses and fractures to be followed by erosion like freeze - thaw cycles and summer rainstorms , and wind ... All these coming together have created a most amazing and beautiful landscape only to be wondered at by us humans.

Following on from our hiking we then returned to the car and took the scenic drive through the park's forest to drive higher and higher and gaze once more down into the canyon.

Then it was a short drive on to the town of Tropic to stay in a cute little log cabin.

And on to the next day .

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