MONDAY, 28 OCTOBER 2024

(Bryce Canyon, UT – Grand Junction, CO)

Up and at ‘em… except we weren’t. I stepped outside briefly to sample the air. Still chilly, but with the cloud clearing across the lake after overnight rain. The ground was already dry. The clouds over the lodge building looked slightly more ominous, but I held out hope they were moving away. Somehow it took us another two hours to make and drink coffee, shower, get ready, pack the cases and put them back in the car. This was nearly a drastic mistake, as I thought breakfast was served until 1030, and only as we got in the car did I realise they stopped serving at 10am. Luckily, with a swift walk from the car park, it was 0955 as we entered the restaurant. Advised that they would start clearing away the food in ten minutes, we loaded up our plates with everything at once and then sat down to enjoy breakfast.

With that done, and suitably fuelled, we drove to Sunset Point, found almost the last remaining parking space, and geared up for our walk. To start with, we descended the steeply sloping Navajo trail, passing Thor’s Hammer and Two Bridges.

I love it at the bottom of this section, as you emerge from the canyon into the woodland area, surrounded by gentle reflected light from the rock, and tall pines climbing towards the now exceptionally blue sky.

We walked along the trail, stopping briefly to remove some layers which were already not needed in the sunshine, and reached a junction and a decision point. Although it would have been lovely to continue through the Queen’s Garden area, we decided to take the short route back, via Wall Street. 

Although it is short, it is not quick, at least not for us. I’m going to claim this is because I kept stopping every eight or so steps, to take another photo or some video, and gloss over us being slow at going up steep climbs at around 8,000 feet. In any case, the scenery was too spectacular to rush.

The Wall Street trail leaves the canyon floor and then passes through a narrow slot canyon section, before climbing up a lot of switchbacks all the way to the rim trail. And there really are a lot.

After we’d made it back to the car, it was sadly time to leave Bryce and start the long drive (circa 330 miles and six hours including a stop) to Grand Junction. Our chosen route took us back through Red Canyon and Panguitch and then north up the Sevier Valley to join I-70. I really like this valley. The high altitude light is airy, and although there are views of mountains to both sides, it is wide and never claustrophobic. The land is mostly agricultural, and there are random old cars and machinery abandoned in fields asking the way.

We took I-70 east, stopping at Salina for a late lunch, before continuing onwards. I’ll let the scenery speak for itself. The whole journey was quiet, in terms of traffic. We saw what appeared to be significant smoke trailing across the sky.

We got our first look at the Colorado River just after 6pm, with the setting sun lighting up golden cottonwood trees along its banks.  Next up were the cliffs of the Colorado National Monument (more of that tomorrow), glowing pink in the fading light.

I had checked in for the hotel online, using the app, so my phone was our room key and we didn’t need to so at reception. We were soon installed in the room, together with our spreading belongings, which as usual have expanded beyond the basic cases and hand luggage and developed a life of their own. We went straight back out to Pablo’s Pizza for dinner, as it was already 7pm ish. While having dinner Andrew looked back to see when we went there last year. It turns out it was exactly a year ago to the day. Happy Pablo’s Day!

And that was it for today. Tomorrow remains to be decided, as the weather is now extremely windy, so we will wait to see what it is like in the morning before planning our activity.