On our second day at Bryce Canyon we opted for an easier hike than yesterday. When we first arrived, the park ranger at the visitor centre shared that his favourite hike was Sheep Creek and Swamp Canyon Loop, so we tried that one. It was still a tough 7 km hike. We saw a snake on the trail - ew! A bit later Seamus and I swore we heard a rattle as we passed by. We didn’t think to look around too hard for the culprit as we were too busy shrieking - yes, both of us! “Ah!” “Ah!” “Ah!” “Ah!” I don’t enjoy snakes on my hikes. The possibility of meeting a rattlesnake especially gives me the heebie jeebies.
Next on our list was the Scenic Drive to the many fabulous view points along the canyon. This is the drive that the first tourists to Bryce Canyon - who would have arrived by train to Cedar City and then taken a bus tour to Bruce - would have visited. The drive helped us beat the midday heat since there were only very short walks to the various lookouts. We got to see Bristlecone Pine trees which are the oldest non-clonal tree on Earth. The trees here are about 1,600 years old with trees of the same type living up to 5,000 years old in California. Our favourite stop on the drive was Natural Bridge which was absolutely incredible. We decided that this view is worthy of being made into a puzzle!
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| The needles looked like bottle brushes. |
Once we had seen everything, we headed into town to do laundry and to stop in at the visitors centre for the boys to turn in their Junior Ranger booklets and receive their badges. We explored town a bit while we were waiting for the dryer to finish and found some insanely beautiful petrified wood and even more importantly, some local-ish ice cream from Salt Lake City.
After supper, we attended the evening ranger program at Bryce Lodge which was a puppet show about the plight of the Utah prairie dogs. We learned that the park’s main prairie dog town was decimated a few years ago by the plague and there are now only about 200 prairie dogs left in the park ( down from about 800). We heard about how hard this has been on the prairie dog survivors. We sincerely wish them luck in the recovery and repopulation process. While we haven’t seen any prairie dogs during our time here, we have seen lots of mule deer. We saw a mother and her fawn on the way back to the campground.
Just before sunset we returned to Sunset Point for one last view of the hoodoo filled amphitheatre. It was just as mesmerizing as when we arrived. This park has been my favourite so far on this trip. It was small, not overly crowded, challenging, and intensely beautiful. It has been an exceptional two days.
We are moving on tomorrow. Can you guess where we’re headed? Here’s a hint…
