Our World - Rainbow Bridge National Monument–Part 3 of Day 2- Boating on Lake Powell

Arrived at the Rainbow Bridge dock around 12:30. 

Read more here.

Boating on Lake Powell–Day 1

Boating on Lake Powell felt like a possibly endless experience with so many side canyons to explore.  Read more here.

Our World–Coral Pink Sand Dunes

Pioneers called it The Sand Hills and the Paiute called it Na-tur-rip or Sandy Land.  Read more.

Cottonwood Canyon Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument

 The Cottonwood Canyon Road follows the Paria River through a desert environment surrounded by towering cliffs of sculpted sandstone...

Johnson Canyon–Welcome to the Wild West

Driving through Johnson Canyon takes you into the real wild of the west and past the old Gunsmoke movie set plus...

Our World–Buckskin Gulch slot canyon Part 2

The Wire Pass trail starts in a wash and continues 1.7 miles to junction with Buckskin Gulch. Along the way the trail winds through...

North Rim AZ to Kanab UT

Time to say goodbye to the North Rim and start the vacation.  First stop, Kanab, Utah for...

Our World - Zion National Park

Zion National Park offers both drives and shuttle rides through a narrow canyon deep below the towering sandstone walls. We road the shuttle up Zion Canyon to...

Our World–Planning a road trip

I love making a plan. Just not Too far in advance. Typically I can’t wrap my brain around more than about six months at a time.

I’m planning a road trip after my season is over mid-October at Grand Canyon. There are some places I want to revisit and lots of new landscapes to explore.

Plus, I’d really like to meet new people along the way also. And I’m positive I’ll cross paths with many.

However, I’m also hoping to meet up with fellow bloggers and some of you may be close enough to my path of adventure to make that possible.

So here’s an informal route and I’m Certainly open to recommendations. Really hope we can cross trails along the way.

Sorry about the funky map, I’m learning

Utah: Bryce National Park, Capital Reef National Park, Sego Canyon Petroglyphs, Dead Horse Point State Park, Canyonland National Park, Arches National Park, Moab, Hole in the Rock, Looking Glass Rocks, Wilson Arch, Church Rock, Valley of the Gods, Navajo Twin Rocks, Recapture Pocket, Hovenweep National Monument.                    Colorado: Mesa Verde National Park.          Four Corners.          Arizona: Navajo National Monument, Canyon De Chelly National Monument, Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site,  Hopi and Navajo lands, Tuba City, Flagstaff and HOME.

Did you notice just a few National Parks?

 

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Rainbow Point Bryce Canyon National Park

When visiting Bryce Canyon we spent our first day hitting all the overlooks, like regular tourons, starting at Rainbow Point.

My kind of Wall Street, no banks and it’s all uphill

After hiking the .7 mile (1.12 km) downhill winding through the fins and hoodoos…

…we found a place a little off trail and across a dry wash to have lunch and enjoy the views looking up.

First part of the return hike was easy and took us past many awesome sights.

Then we came upon the start of “Wall Street,” a narrow crack between the fins to begin our assent.

And this our warning.

Yet I felt surrounded by an ancient serenity.

As the elders looked down upon us, the small.

And many of us walked this trail (some dressed for a casual walk along the NY Wall Street)…

…under arches…

…below more of the stone people.

I pause so often to take photos…

…I barely notice the climb as strenuous.

Maybe the ancients give me strength.

We neared the top and joined the heads of stone.

Mike said he had a stiff neck from all the looking up.

Now we looked back down.

Such a magical and captivating landscape that I want to return and immerse myself amongst these Ancients again.

 

The Navajo Loop trail is only 1.3 miles (2 km) long with a 550 foot (167 m) drop in elevation but it took us four hours to hike and over 1000 photos between us.

MWT - Hiking Navajo Loop (downhill) at Bryce Canyon

After spending a day touroning around all the overlooks  (more posts coming) and looking down on the hoodoos, fins, windows, arches and bridges the next morning we took a trail into the canyon. 

The Navajo Loop trail is only 1.3 miles (2 km) long with a 550 foot (167 m) drop in elevation.

The trail winds under arches of orange and yellow…

…past windows to a blue world…

Thors Hammer

…and below towering hoodoos full of faces.

Then down switchbacks between the fins and into a different world.

Almost eye level with this amazing geology. Hoodoo, a pillar of rock, or, to cast a spell, maybe both.         

Two Bridges

The oldest gray-brown rock at the bottom was deposited by repeated seaways during the Cretaceous Period between 144 to 65 million years ago.         

For the next 25 million years, in the Tertiary Period, rivers and streams flowed into an ancient freshwater lake and deposited iron-rich, limy sediments that became reddish-pink rocks, the Claron Formation, from which the hoodoos are carved.         

After uplift, the steep slopes along the plateau’s rim allow increased erosion scouring off softer rock, creating gullies with enough soil for pines and firs to reach for the sky.

…and leaving harder rock as fins…

…which continue to erode into hoodoos…

…of the most whimsical shapes.         

Paiutes living in the area when settlers arrived from the east called hoodoos the “Legend People” whom Coyote had turned to stone.         

Named after mormon Ebenezer Bryce who built his home and ranch in the Paria Valley in 1875 with the canyons in his back yard.         

In 1923 President Harding proclaimed part of the area as Bryce Canyon National Monument and in 1928 legislation passed that changed it to a National Park.

After hiking down .7 miles (1.12 km) we began the assent into Wall Street. More to come.

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