Bryce Canyon

Our second night at Calf Creek the weather changed – the temperature dropped and there was some fairly heavy rain in the night. We left first thing in the morning and drove towards Bryce Canyon. As we got closer to Bryce and started driving uphill we began to notice the temperature dropping still further and patches of snow on the ground. By the time that we reached Bryce the ground was covered in snow and the temperature was hovering around -2c.

The first thing we did was drop in at the visitor centre and look at the weather forecast – they were expecting -10c to -12c overnight. Easy decision then – we weren’t staying the night like we’d planned.

We headed over to the main amphitheatre at Sunset Point and set out on a walk down the cliffs. We walked down the Navajo loop and then to extend things went around Queen Victoria’s Gardens before ascending back to Sunrise Point.

The trail descended sharply into a canyon with really tall trees – but still not tall enough to reach the top of the canyon. Everything looked amazing with a sprinkling of snow. The walls of the canyon are covered in hoodoos and it really is an exceptionally pretty park.

The area known as Queen Victoria’s Garden has a hoodoo which looks not dissimilar to Queen Victoria herself.

After the walk we drove along the scenic drive and checked out a few of the viewpoints. To be honest it was really more of the same. The final viewpoint was called Rainbow point and is the highest point in the park. It was bitterly cold here and we didn’t hang around.

For the evening we drove about 80 miles South to Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park. This is a really small state park with its claim to fame being a couple of strikingly coloured sand dunes. There was a great little campground here with hot showers (now we may have a shower on board but unlimited hot water is something we can’t pass up).