Bryce Canyon National Park

We visited Bryce Canyon National Park this last weekend and it was AMAZING. We took so many pictures, most of which are on facebook, but I'm only going to post a few select ones on here. It was a really funny experience, since before we left, it looked like everything was stacking up against us having a fun/exciting/successful/dry camping trip.

First, the forecast was calling for rain and thunderstorms along with flash floods. Ok, we weren't so worried about the flash floods, since we knew we wouldn't be hiking down in the canyon. We were much more concerned about the rain and the thunderstorms, since both our dogs are horribly afraid of thunder and well, it's just not a ton of fun to camp in the rain.

Second problem was that we couldn't reserve a campsite, (it's all first come, first served at Bryce Canyon.) Knowing that we were going to be arriving late, probably after dark, on a Friday night in August meant that we were not that hopeful at finding an open campsite. We had checked around and were open to roughing it in the National Forest, (dispersed camping) which Bryan and I have done on other occasions...the worry with that was that it would be extremely difficult to find a great place to put up a tent in the wilderness in the dark.

The third concern that came up was that we were all running behind schedule, and after a full day of work on Friday we didn't get on the road towards the park until almost 7pm. It's a three and a  half hour drive to Bryce, so we knew we would be pulling in pretty late at night. Setting up a tent in the dark is NOT my favorite thing, and combined with the possibility of rain, thundershowers, potentially nervous/anxious dogs, AND possibly not having a campsite...not a fun combination. All of this added up to a bit of stress, and even my wonderfully even-keeled and always positive hubby was positively (although quietly) grumpy about it as we drove south on the interstate. I really wondered if we had made a mistake in going.

We were so pleasantly surprised when we arrived. The weather was perfectly calm, and aside from the occasional cloud, you could see amazingly bright stars. Apparently because of the weather forecast, most people had chosen to stay home and there were several empty campsites for us to choose from. Amanda and Kristen got to work setting up the tent as Bryan started a campfire and I watched the dogs. We tried to whisper and be quiet as we set up camp at 10:30pm. Once we got settled in we made S'mores and hot chocolate to enjoy around the campfire. The dogs were excited to be there with us, and seemed happy to be along for the adventure. Lucky for them, the forecasted thunderstorms never happened and we had a blissfully uneventful night.

The next morning we were up and ready to go early...about 10:30am. Hey, there's no reason to rush when you're supposed to be out relaxing, right? Bryan was wonderful and built a fire and made us all breakfast. He got up before any of us girls and had everything ready to go before we were up. The doggies loved getting the leftover eggs and bacon, and also enjoyed their walk around the campground with Bryan and I before we packed everything up to tour the park.

Obviously, our first stop was to the Visitor's Center to stamp our atlas. We also got our requisite magnet and patch. Outside the VC a volunteer ranger had a special telescope that you could look through to see a sunspot. It was really cool, since I've never looked at the sun before. Because of the filter on the telescope, the sun appeared red, and the little black pencil dot was the sunspot. He explained that the tiny dot was actually larger than Earth!

We didn't do any hiking on this trip, but we did the auto route along the rim of the spectacular canyon. We had so much fun, but unfortunately I was having a rough day on Saturday, (fatigue and sun sickness) so I was not able to see all the viewpoints. Still, it was great to be able to go, and we were able to visit some amazing places with our friends Kristen and Amanda. At the park's general store, we were able to order a whole pizza for lunch, and we had fun sitting on the covered porch while we ate. Coincidentally, it rained for about five minutes while we ate...the only rain that we had on the trip! All in all, it ended up being a wonderful trip and we were all so glad to have gone!

I feel so lucky that Bryan and my wonderful friends have been so patient with my limitations right now. Bryan and I work three full time jobs between us, (Bryan has the brunt of it, working 80 hours a week) so the opportunity to do these little trips really helps us to feel like we are still taking full advantage of life. We were all exhausted on the way home, probably the combination of the 9,000 ft. elevation and the heat. In spite of that, we had such a great time, and the trip was a complete success!