Down in the Hoodoos

Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah

The park has an incredible collection of pinnacles, fins and spires which are difficult to capture in all their glory with a cheap digital camera.

The old sand dunes from the Jurrasic were solidified by minerals and upthrust nearly two miles. The rock have too many colors to describe: white, red, cinnamon, chocolate and even blue with the addition of a little manganese.

At this elevation there are an average of 200 days a year that the temperature drops below freezing and then rises above freezing during the day. Water trickles down into cracks, freezes, thaws and sculpts the strange "Hoodoo" shapes that stretch in the Canyon for miles. The Paiute Indians avoided the canyon, fearing that they would also be turned into pinnacles.

Bryce, while huge,  is just a small part of the "Escalante-Grand Staircase" area that includes 2,000,000 acres of geologic wonderland.

We did a mule ride today down into the Canyon floor. Mrs. Phred had a little mule named "Mouse". My mule was a sweetie named "Rachel".

In the morning we're heading further east to the little town of Torrey, Utah. It's just outside the Capitol Reef National Monument (part of the Grand Staircase).

Maybe we can see the North Rim of the Grand Canyon this year before we head for San Francisco? The North rim opened today.

Two Miles High

Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah

These are the tennis courts just outside the Zion National Park. We left Zion this morning and backtracked east to the Bryce Canyon National Park.

To get to Bryce, we lumber up a mountain range to 10,000 feet. The air is so thin that the peacocks can't get off the ground.



At the top of the mountain range is a large flat plateau covered with deep snow that lasts about ten miles. We see a a highway warning sign with a cow on the yellow diamond. The notion of high altitude cows makes us both laugh. I keep expecting oxygen masks to drop down from the ceiling.

Mr. Bryce was an early Mormon settler who moved near the canyon in 1825. Upon viewing the complex canyon from a peak at 8,800 feet, he is said to have commented, "That's a hell of a place to lose a cow."

The sandstone erosion patterns are fairly unique. The Indians called the pinnacles "hoodoos" and might have thought of them as people turned to stone.

We have a hike planned along the rim today. Maybe a horseback ride down into the canyon tomorrow, then on to the Capitol Reef National park.

Bryce Canyon National Park

Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah

Bryce is known for Hoodoos, Antelope herds, Bristlecone pines and excellent stargazing. Ebenezer Bryce was a Mormon who settled in the mouth of the canyon in the 1870s. When asked about the canyon he reportedly said, 'It's a hell of a place to lose a cow.'

Like many of the great parks, the Union Pacific railroad built a huge rustic lodge here to stimulate rail travel before the property became a park in the early 20th century. During the Great Depression, the Civilian Conservation Corp jobs program developed many of the trails and other facilities that still exist in America's parks.




Bristlecone pines live on the rim of the 10,000 foot summit and are known to reach ages of 1600 years. Hoodoos are orange spires formed here in the desert by erosion from rain. The Paiute Indians said that they were 'legend people' who had been turned to stone by the trickster Coyote.

 

We drive the motorbike 20 miles up to the Sunset Point summit and walked the Bristlecone trail. The average visibility is 113 miles. The park boasts the best star-gazing conditions in the US. They claim you can see your shadow by the light from Venus. Unfortunately it was overcast in the evening.