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Published: April 20th 2010
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It would have been good to have spent an extra day in Zion National Park, but if we did that for all the places we visited, i think we would be travelling until Christmas! We can't always have things go our way!
The drive was not that far from Zion to Bryce so we explored a bit of Zion before we left. It was not the best of weather, but at least it was not raining. We managed to see the Court of the Patriachs which is 3 large rocks named Abraham; Jacod and Isaac. And then, on the way out of the park, we stopped for a short walk for an overlook of the Canyon. At least we got a glimpse of the beauty of Zion.
Before we reached Bryce Canyon we drove through Red Rock Canyon - just to get a taste of what was to come. The rocks were a startling red colour, we just had to stop for some pictures.
The rim of the Canyon sits at about 9000 feet (so we were camping pretty high up!) so we were not too surprised to see that there was plenty of snow lying on the
ground. And by the time we arrived at the visitor centre it had begun to snow - Billy was so happy. It was a bit surreal putting up our tent in the snow! How was i going to survive the cold night (little did i know just how cold it was going to get).
But, as it was a novelty for us to camp among the snowy hills, i had not yet thought that far ahead.
We spent the rest of the day driving the length of the park stoppping at every bend to view the canyon. Bryce Canyon is famous for its spires called 'hoodoos', which are formed from years of erosion by frost and the melting of snow. We were fascinated.
That night it dropped to our lowest temperature yet (-10'C) but surprisingly i was quite snug in my sleeping bag (albeit in thermals, tracksuit pants and long socks) but i survived. We decided to have a bit of a lie in - until the sun warmed up our tent and the outside temperature. It was a beautiful day, the sun was shining which was just as well because we were wanting to do a walk
amongst the hoodoos.
We spent most of the day walking in the snow dwarfed by the rock formations. Our walked included the Queens Garden whereby we saw a hoodoo resembling Queen Victoria - it was quite amazing. We walked for about 4 hours around some of the most scenic areas, uphill and downhill, winding our way around the rocks and through deep snow. It was unusually beautiful.
We had lots of fun and i think that this has been my favourite Park so far. The combination of the snowy fields and cliffs with the strange rock creations will continue to fascinate me.
We continue our travels in Utah and move onto Arches National Park next - we cannot wait.
I want to just appologize for all the photos, i found it very hard to stop.
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anonymous
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This place looks weird! It's desert on the one half and snow on the other and the word "hoodoo's" is very strange =)