Argyle Background

Sunday, July 26, 2015

Bryce Canyon National Park


For the July 24th weekend, Brady and I decided to check something off my bucket list.  We went camping in Bryce Canyon National Park and I was not disappointed!  Unfortunately, pictures just do not do justice to this beautiful place.  All I can say is that you need to visit it for yourself.  =)

Thursday morning we got up and left home early.  Most sites in Bryce Canyon NP is first come first serve.  We were able to get there by 10am and pick out a nice spot for our two night stay.  After that, we dropped back down into Panguitch for a couple work meetings I had.  In between meetings, we stopped by the local pizza place and enjoyed us some lunch.




On our way back to Bryce, we stopped by the Red Canyon visitors center.  Brady made me pick up the elk legs just so we could show Julie.....

One thing we had read about Bryce Canyon NP is that there are 15 different overlooks throughout the park and each of them gives you a different view of what the park has to offer.  We spent a few hours driving around the rim and viewing each one of those viewpoints.





 
 





 













 Is it weird that I love the look of dead trees?!



 And the view that Bryce is probably most known by...
















Friday morning started with waking up early to see the sunrise...


Then after some breakfast, we spent the rest of the morning hiking.  Because of what we wanted to see, we hiked down into the canyon twice.  Very tiring on the legs!








As tiring as it was to go down and up those switchbacks, the views were absolutely amazing!

The first time we went down we hiked back up to see the two natural bridges.  You can't really see them well in the background, but I promise they are there.


Then hiking back up some different switchbacks.  I seriously wonder how long it took them to make these switchbacks!





The second time down was so we could see the queens garden (honestly not really that cool, but it was still a fun hike).



Can you see the queen?




Then back up the switchbacks.  We went back up the way we went down the first time.



By the end of hiking those two hikes (probably around 7ish miles total), our legs were pretty tired from going up and down so much.  We just went for a drive and relaxed at our campsite the rest of the day.

Saturday we got up, clean up camp and checked out one other view point.



We found out there was a hike into this canyon, so we want to go back and hike it someday.

We finished off our trip with hiking to Mossy Cave and waterfall.




 It was a great trip and I'm glad we made it!