Walking in Bryce Canyon

I took the free shuttle service into Bryce Canyon National Park, expecting us to have to stop and show our passes, like on the shuttle into Zion.  That way I would have got a park newspaper, which contains maps and useful information like hiking trails..

But we didn’t, so I had to make do with the map I had looked at on the bus stop while waiting for the shuttle.  Thankfully, being on my own I’m not too interested in going off the beaten track, so I decided to do a combination of four of the walks, each about a mile long, giving me a good two hours up close and personal with the rock formations.

Here are some shots from my walk around the rim of the Amphitheatre (as its called).

Once I got to Sunset Point, I headed down into the Canyon itself, through Wall Street (two sheer sides of red rock under which goes the path) and along the Navajo Trail, before picking up another couple of routes to get me up to Sunrise Point, and the shuttle bus back to the car.  The guide book described it as fairly strenuous—and I would agree with that, at 8300 feet up even climbing the stairs is fairly strenuous.

Along the way I saw some stunning scenery, admired the well-constructed path, and some native wildlife as well.

After this I was very hot, and tired, and hungry, so I downed a litre of water, having already drunk a bottle during the walk, and got the shuttle back to Ruby’s Inn.  I felt I deserved something junk food-y so I went to the diner, and got confused by the waitress.

I said, ‘I think I’ll have a pizza,’ looking up at the menu board above the tills.  ‘Here is our lunch menu,’ she said, giving me a piece of paper.  ‘Ah,’ from yours truly—and I could see there was no pizza on the lunch menu.  So, assuming she had given me the piece of paper to choose something from, after I had expressed a preference for something not on the lunch menu, I ordered a steak sandwich.

It came, and was totally inedible.  I thought the pretzel was salty at the Grand Canyon, but this was something else, and unlike the pretzel I couldn’t shake it off!  I took it to one of the waitresses who was cleaning up a table, told her it was inedible.  To be honest, it was barely even food.  I didn’t say that last part.  She looked so shocked, she didn’t know what to say, didn’t offer a refund, and I was hot, tired and couldn’t be bothered to argue with a fast food restaurant—I suppose I should have expected it—so I left it with her and walked out.

I mean, look at it.. I would barely even call that mince.  You can see I took a big bite—I was famished!—so the shock was quite big when what I tasted was some sort of sea-flavoured goo, with rancid plastic cheese that hadn’t melted yet on top, inside a microwaved bun.

Yum.

The drive from Ruby’s Inn to Moab was long, so I took a couple of breaks to stretch my legs.  The interstate was long and windy (that’s w-eye-ndy and w-inn-dy), and I had the top up, down and up again due to rain, lovely warm sunshine, and then soaring temperatures (39-40C).  Here’s part of the interstate, called ‘Spotted Wolf Canyon’:

 And one of the Mustang at the viewing point, just for good measure:

Tomorrow I am heading off first thing to drive to Mesa Verde (Colorado), for the Pueblo Classic Tour, which will be very different to everything I’ve seen so far, and I think one of the highlights of the trip.  So, tonight is my last night in Utah, having already seen the back of Nevada and Arizona already!  I am whizzing through these Western states—I have driven nearly 1000 miles in the last four days!