Grand Teton NP to Yellowstone NP

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Monday, May 26, 2014

I woke up at 5:22am and had to pee. I thought it was the middle of the night. Clay was sound asleep. When I came out of the bathroom, I realized that there was light streaming in around all the curtains. I went through to the living room and opened the curtains and was awestruck. The sun was just rising and throwing color and the skies were blue and the water was reflecting the Grand Teton range. It was all just breathtakingly beautiful.

I went back in the bedroom and woke Clay up. He acted like why was I waking him up in the middle of the night and I pointed out the window and told him he was missing an incredible sunrise. I watched it from the windows and door as the light changed color and lit up the Grand Teton range and Jackson Lake. It stayed beautiful well past our breakfast and checkout.

We were on the road north to Yellowstone National Park early hoping to see some of the many grizzlies everyone was reporting and showing photos of to the north of Signal Mountain Lodge. We stopped on the dam and took some more photos. We saw a small herd of elk. I spotted a lone Sandhill Crane in a meadow and finally got a photo of one! We stopped at Colter Bay and finally found some souvenirs we wanted to buy from Grand Teton National Park before we left it.

In almost no time we were entering Yellowstone, I think it was only 22 miles. Neither of us had done any homework on this subject. I had several pieces of tourist information on Yellowstone that I had been carrying since Denver but I hadn’t had a chance to study them. Anyway, we decided we had 7 hours and we should do the Northern Loop. Yellowstone has 2 loop drives like a figure eight. We are staying tonight below the bottom of the lower loop in Grant Village and we have dinner reservations for 6pm. We headed north and only stopped for things that really caught our eye on the part of the lower loop that we’ll plan to do tomorrow.

The first remarkable thing was the amount of snow on the ground. We had only come 22 miles, but it was what you might expect as a change after a 300 mile drive. The lakes we passed, Lewis Lake and Yellowstone, were really big and almost completely frozen over. We did not expect that! No wonder all the people on our float trip that had come to Grand Teton NP from Yellowstone NP were thrilled with all the animals and bears they were seeing. All the animals here must still be wintering! And how would they get around anyway in snow over an adult's head?

We saw a lot of waterfalls today. We saw a lot of bison today. The first was Lewis Falls at 29 feet. We saw an elk in the road that went to Grant Village where we’ll be dining and sleeping tonight. We stopped at LeHardys Rapids and to see a steam vent sinkhole in a parking lot at Sulphur Cauldron. It smelled bad and was a little scary. We drove over Dunraven Pass which was a terrifying and twisty climbing road. According to the NPS Yellowstone website this is the Beartooth Highway and it wasn’t opened for the season until May 23.

There were a lot of side roads still closed and stores still closed but it seemed crazy busy and crowded to us anyway. It also got really hot today. I can’t imagine it here in summer with real heat and real crowds and without the cooling effect of all the massive mounds of snow. 

We stopped at Tower Falls at 132 feet. It was right near a big stone tower standing over the road. Specimen Ridge across the Yellowstone River is the world’s largest petrified forest. We actually thought they were lava tubes until I read about the petrified forest. We ate our picnic lunch at the picnic tables outside the closed store here.

Next stop was Petrified Tree. I am not sure how or why that got a map mention from the NPS when Specimen Ridge rated no notice at all! We wouldn’t have driven down the side road to a single tree if we had realized about the forest. At some point we saw a lot of people in the road and rangers were out and traffic was backed up and we found a parking place and got out and walked over to the crowd parked there and learned that there was a mama bear and 3 cubs down in the woods in the shadows in a hollow. We listened to see where to find them and I used my binoculars to watch the one cub in a tree. It looked like he was about 5 feet off the ground. While I watched him, he fell out of the tree and held on with one arm before losing his grip. He got up and ran off and then we couldn’t see any. It was so far away and dark that I don’t know if Clay got any photos. I tried to shoot photos of one of the cubs as we made our way around the bend of the hollow they were in. (Sorry I checked the photos and we got nothing!) 

We walked a mile round trip to see Wraith Falls and then went down and across the road and saw the same Lava Creek fall even farther at Undine Falls. According to the map they were both right by the road. Not! Only Undine was within 20 feet of the road. Wraith Falls was a long hard steep hike for us! Near here we came upon a lot of stopped traffic and one way, as there was a minivan that had run off our side of the road and was resting on its roof. That's unfortunate, but at least it happened here and not on the part where crossing that line on the pavement would have meant falling 100s of feet.

We came to Mammoth Hot Springs about 3pm. We were at the half way point of the loop and only had 3 hours left before our dinner reservation. It was really hot, we were tired and cranky and it looked like the State Fair was going on here. We didn’t know what to look for here, but we could tell by the parking lots and hundreds of people we could see climbing the 300 foot elevation of boardwalks of the Lower Terrace Area that we didn’t want to go there.

We drove on to the Upper Terrace that I had information was a one-way driving loop. That was true, but there were still lots of parking lots and boardwalks. We did some of them and I am sure we missed a lot here, but we weren’t enjoying ourselves now anyway so it was just time to move on. I don’t really remember anything of note after this.

We just fought crazy drivers for about 60 miles to get back to Grant Village and checked in and arrived within minutes of our dinner reservation time. I had pork and mashed potatoes and Clay had his best beer yet (I have no idea what it was) and trout amandine. Either he was really hungry or it was really good. He announced half way through that he was going to eat all his meal tonight. I told him I was going to have 2 slices of pork and potatoes left over and he took my plate and finished mine. He really liked both. He ate all the asparagus from both our plates. He ordered dessert. They had huckleberry ice cream and he really liked mine the other day in Jackson from Moo’s.  He ordered that and I had some. We got back to the room and finished bringing up the luggage.

We are in the Antelope Building in room 1214. It is on the 2^nd floor again in a building without elevators. (What is going on with this?!) There is no view and a warning of an aggressive elk to beware. Maybe the one we saw out in the road here this morning? Anyway, the room is large and has 2 double beds, 2 chairs, a desk, stool and Keurig coffee maker. The bathroom is small with a shower over tub. They did have a little bear-shaped bar of soap in there by sink! I don’t think I have mentioned that there is no TV in any of these park lodgings. There is no in room Internet either. Back to this room though. The Grant Village is rather soulless and unattractive. The room has the most inappropriate and unattractive décor and art of any of the national park properties yet. It doesn’t look rustic or western, there is nothing even to make you think you are in Yellowstone. You might as well be at some convention center motel, but without TV or Internet. We are only here for one night and it is about half the price of the last 2 nights in Signal Mountain Lodge's cabin. We paid $176 upon reserving this room and that paid for the one night here. So. Tomorrow, we move for 2 nights to Old Faithful Snow Lodge. We’ll see how that is. Fingers crossed!

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Grand Teton National Park

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Sunday, May 25, 2014

We had to set an alarm to make sure we got up by 6am today. I didn’t hear it go off but Clay was up and woke me at 6am. It was already light outside. We could see it around the curtains. We were anxious to see what it looked like out there this morning since we have a 2-3 hour float trip and it poured yesterday and last night. We opened the curtains and we couldn’t see more than several feet from the cabin. We were inside a cloud! It was cold too, maybe lower 40 to upper 30s F. We ate some breakfast in the cabin, got bundled up with layers and set off.

We had to meet in front of the Signal Mountain Lodge’s restaurant by 7:20am. There were 6 of us there waiting until after 7:30am for the guides to show up with the van for us. They explained that this was the first week of the summer schedule departing at 7:30 instead of 8:30am and they hadn’t gotten used to it yet. We drove down the outside park road to Deadman’s Bar Road and found bright sun and clear skies. We had driven out of the cloud over Jackson Lake. There we put on our life vests, got our safety talk and Mark and Peter helped us load in to the large raft. I had gone to use the toilet first, so Clay and I were last to load and that meant the other 2 couples got the back half of the boat and Clay and I had the front half to ourselves. That was lucky!

The Snake River was very high and in places over its bank from the heavy rain yesterday. It was flowing rapidly and Peter was surprised in places where it was deep and had been meadows not long ago. He told us to listen for the crackle and popping noises and explained that was the rocks on the river bottom being tumbled along by the strong current. We saw a lot of birds, mostly Canada Geese who are year round residents. But, we did see a bald eagle, a pair of sand cranes (sorry, no photo again!) and a pair of white pelicans.

It was looking like we wouldn’t see any moose which Peter had us on the lookout for, but right before we put out, at Moose Junction, there was a female lying in the willows beside the river. I don’t think Clay got a photo because she was hard to see lying down in heavy foliage and backlit by the morning sun. The ears gave her away. Peter had told us about a big bull moose they named Hollywood who had taken up residence under the bridge by the Visitor’s Center at Moose Junction a summer or so ago. He was sure we would see him. Well, after the raft and the van were loaded we drove across the bridge and I saw something brown coming down the river in the brown current. As it got closer to the opposite shore, it got larger and larger and finally enough was showing that I realized it was not a log but a swimming moose! A big one. I called it out and pointed and Peter was very excited that Hollywood was back. He asked me where he came from and I told him I guessed from the other shore because I thought he was a log in the river when only part of his head was visible. Peter looked across the trajectory the moose must have traveled swimming across the current and we agreed he had to have just left from the parking lot we had just come from too. Crazy! He was massive with small antlers right now. We drove back later and walked out on the bridge looking for him since Peter said he was such a camera ham but we didn’t find him.

As we were nearing Signal Mountain Lodge again from Moran Junction, we saw a small black bear on a green hill not far from the road. When we got back to SML about 10:30am the cloud over Jackson Lake was still there but had retreated about half way across towards the Tetons.  Peter showed us on a map a bunch of places to drive and look for animals this afternoon.

Now we just had to get a map of our own. Since the entry booths have been closed when we came through we haven’t gotten the usual slick brochure and newspaper. After going back down to Moose and the visitor’s center to get a good map, we drove everywhere Peter told us and we saw a lot of animals today. Our best sighting was down the short side of a paved road that Peter had not recommended but I told Clay to try first just to see. We found our own private small bison herd. They were moving, large, medium and small and they crossed the road right in front of us. It was incredible! (I think we have no photos, because the bison were on my side of the car when we spotted them, so I was going to take the photos. As they started across, Clay told me to video them, but only gave me half the instructions for how to do it. So, evidently I just watched it through the camera’s view screen and didn’t video or photograph anything. I feel sick about it because this was one of the highlights of our trip.)

We made our way all the way down to Jackson Hole or Jackson the town. Clay remembered seeing an Albertson’s there but we didn’t find it. We filled the gas tank and shopped at Jackson Whole Grocer. We bought supplies for a couple of days of breakfasts and lunches. We stopped and parked next to Jackson Town Square and walked around it. I had tried to get Clay to buy a pint of Moo’s huckleberry ice cream for our dessert tonight at Jackson Whole Grocer. We had a cooler full of ice in the car and it would be fine until we could put it in the freezer at the cabin, but he said no. So, as we made our circuit of the square we found Moo’s scoop shop and Clay said we could have some now. I got huckleberry and it was delicious. Clay got something with chocolate and it was ok but nothing special. We both really loved the huckleberry.

On the way back to the cabin, we walked down a closed road where Peter told us to look for moose and bears, but only found Canada geese and 1 coyote.

When we drove out Pacific Creek Road which he said was full of bears, we only found elk. But amazingly, we got to see a calf nursing and then reluctantly cross a stream. The last animal we saw before getting back home was a moose. It didn’t rain all day and the day turned out sunny and warm. We saw a lot of beautiful scenery and a lot of animals. It was a good day.

We came home to watch the sunset finally give a few minutes of a little color and then some stars came out as it got cold again and we ate food we had stocked in our little kitchen. It was all good. We did have a little snafu when we realized that the frozen pizza we bought needed to be cooked in an oven and we didn’t have one. Clay cooked it in a Dutch oven on the stove top and then finished it on a plate in the microwave. It must have been good because he ate the whole thing. I finished off most of the rest of my burrito from last night. I still didn’t eat it all. That was one crazy massive burrito! It was good though. I had popcorn out on the back deck as I watched the stars come out while Clay walked to the Lodge Registration building for Internet access to check email.  It doesn't get better than this!

We plan to wake up when we wake up tomorrow, but would like to set off early to have a better chance to see more animals. Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Park (our final park destination) are adjoining, so we expect a scenic drive with lots of wildlife. Fingers crossed for good weather. People we have spoken to here that came down from Yellowstone say there is still a lot of snow on the ground and more bears here than there. Since we only saw one here we hope that changes. There is plenty of snow still on the ground here. Signal Mountain Road is still closed due to the snow packed on it. They are still doing some plowing as we saw today, but a lot of it they must just wait for it to melt. The other reason we heard for the road closure was that there were mother bears and cubs up there. Maybe, there were a lot of folks showing off their bear and cub photos. We got skunked on that one though. Well, that is it for today.

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Leaving Salt Lake City

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Saturday, May 24, 2014

We got up about 6 to 6:30am again. We were signed up for 8am breakfast. We had some extra time so we got mostly packed up before going downstairs. Today breakfast was juice, eggs cooked to order and biscuits with sausage gravy. And we were worried about me balking at a breakfast. Clay hates and refuses to eat any gravy! He told the woman not to put any gravy on his plate and they offered him an omelet instead but he said no. They brought him some ham slices and butter and jam for his plain biscuits. The sausage gravy wasn’t very good and I love biscuits and gravy. Plus the chef had sprinkled chopped chives and red pepper flakes on top! Yuck! We also got sliced strawberry, kiwi and pineapple with some grapes. It was not as good as breakfast yesterday. It had started raining yesterday afternoon and it really rained overnight and it was pouring this morning. It was colder too. We checked out and left around 9am. There was some kind of misunderstanding with the GPS, but I had a map and we eventually got headed north out of SLC about 9:20am.

Our first stop was Antelope Island State Park. We paid our $10 admission before driving across the causeway into the Great Salt Lake. It wasn’t raining, but it was very windy. First stop was the visitor’s center. This very spare and raw unfinished looking building was surrounded with nesting swallows of some kind. It was crazy! (Ah. They were barn swallows.) They were flitting and sitting all over, seemingly trying to get inside. As we drove around the island, we spotted a grouse, a coyote, a pronghorn, and 2 different herds of bison as well as 4 individual bison right beside the road. One even crossed the road in front of us and other cars. The grouse and the coyote crossed the road in front of us too and were so quick that I failed to get photos. The bison had recently calved! There were all kinds of birds. This is a migratory nesting spot for American white pelicans. Who knew? It was a good stop.

Next stop was Golden Spike National Historic Site. Clay’s Senior Pass got us in. This is where to transcontinental railroads met to complete the cross-country railroad on May 10, 1869. We got there in time to see most of the 1:15pm Last Spike Reenactment. That was great. We were running behind so we didn’t watch the 20 minute film or drive the auto tour.

We stopped at a Maverik convenience store and bought a yogurt for me and nabs for Clay as well as a giant fountain Coke Zero and kept driving. We stopped again at a truck stop in McCammon, Idaho for gas and more snacks and to use the restrooms. We could see rain in the distance for most of the day. Until we caught up with it! We tried to mostly drive a scenic byway.

Just inside Wyoming, in Etna on Hwy. 89 we ran into a cattle drive blocking the road in the rain! We drove right through Jackson, WY about 6pm. We drove all the way to what must be the furthest northeast point of Grand Teton National Park to reach Signal Mountain Lodge, our home for the next 2 nights about 7:15pm. We got checked in and got our paperwork for tomorrow’s 7:30am Snake River float trip that we booked online from SLC. That was $136 paid online at booking for the 2 of us. Since it has rained most of the day today and it is much colder up here, we have our fingers crossed for at least not pouring rain tomorrow morning.

On the way here we saw what looked like cranes, actually the first one I saw was running in a field and I thought it looked like small rhea, but it turns out there are migratory Sandhill cranes around here with the American white pelicans. We also saw trumpeter swans, elk, and pronghorns. The scenery here is just stunning. It looks like I imagine the Alps. Snow covered craggy peaks behind calm lakes.

We are in cabin 152 of the Signal Mountain Lodge on the shores of Jackson Lake. It is like a small apartment facing the lake and the Grand Tetons to the west. It has a living room/dining room, a back deck, a kitchen with everything but an oven, 2 queen beds, a split bathroom with a sink and then a shower over tub and toilet. It is all very nice and clean. It is  $319 a night and comes with a sofa bed, so I guess if you were sleeping 6 it would be reasonably priced. It is a bit extravagant for just us. As the sun was setting we went for dinner at The Trapper Grill. It was not a particularly beautiful sunset again, but the setting was spectacular. Clay had a dark beer and fish & chips. I had a burrito that was bigger than my head! Since we have a full kitchen we got half of it to go and stopped for some more groceries for our meals tomorrow in the cabin. It is well past my bedtime now and I have an early morning tomorrow. So…

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Salt Lake City

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Friday, May 23, 2014

I didn’t sleep well last night. There is a lot of light through the big bay wall of windows. The Mormon Temple a block away is lit up like the Hollywood sign. The mattress has a hole in the middle and it kept sucking me down and I kept crawling out. It is a beautiful property though. We got up about 6:30am and lolled around in a leisurely fashion until 8:15am and time for our breakfast. We went down to the dining room to find one other couple seated. The hostess asked us to help ourselves to hot beverages and offered a variety of juices. Clay took apple peach passion. It smelled and tasted just like a fresh peach. She also asked how we like our eggs fried. We told her and she left. So, you get what they are serving for breakfast or go without evidently. The dingbat girl that checked us in yesterday told us to sign up for hot breakfast, “We only serve hot breakfast.” We weren’t sure exactly what she meant by that emphatic statement but I guess that is what she meant. They are cooking a hot breakfast and if you don’t eat it you aren’t getting a bowl of cereal or yogurt instead. This is all conjecture on my part because we didn’t test it and didn’t see any of the other 6 people who came in challenge it either. So, she brought us each out 2 fried eggs to our order with 2 slices of bacon, 4 melon slices and 2 pineapple slices. Then she brought us each another plate with 3 slices of thick French Toast and 6 berries. 3 raspberries and 3 blackberries. She also brought out a small pitcher of maple syrup. It was all good and we ate everything but the melon slices. It was a big breakfast, a two-fer!

After breakfast we left the Inn on the uphill side and tried unsuccessfully to figure out how to get the car to the upper parking lot to cut out 29 of the stairs with the bags in the morning. We didn’t figure it out. We may have to drive around after coming back from dinner tonight and see if we can find it. We have the turn by turn emailed directions on reaching the lots and I may have to read those off again to Clay while in the car. We walked uphill to the Utah capital building and to the visitor’s center across the street. We picked up a better map and a self-guided historic SLC walking tour to help identify things. Our goals today are a guided tour of Temple Square and an organ recital from noon to 12:30pm in the Tabernacle. We did accomplish both. Next we were on a quest for a bus map. We are staying and touring inside UTA/TRAX’s fare free zone, but can’t seem to find any information about the bus routes. Our Inn on the Hill is aptly named. The block from Temple Square to the Inn is just about straight up steep. We’d really liked to have been able to take a bus back up. No one was ever able to answer or provide a route map. Raleigh does better than this with a free bus around the capital city downtown area!

We walked through City Creek Park with the rats and homeless people then through the Brigham Young Historic Park, for some reason the rats didn’t come to this side of the street. We were still disturbing the homeless people though. They have some very nice water features through downtown Salt Lake City using City Creek. It goes under the streets and sidewalks and then re-emerges through rocky channels, in streams as a work of art about pilgrim agriculture, as waterfalls and fountains, etc. It is very well done and certainly much more pleasant than just ditching it under the surface.

We took the hourly tour of Temple Square from the flagpole at 11am. There were about 15 people in our group. If you stop moving in Temple Square or sit down anywhere in the gardens or even stand still and make eye contact. You will be accosted by a missionary. “Where are you from?”, asked with a big smile. It seems innocuous enough. How can you take offense? But that is just the softening opening. After being asked about 20 times in the past 20 hours (8 of which I was asleep in bed!) I was starting to get snappish when asked! I felt bad about my responses but honestly they ran us off out of there. I told Clay it is their space and they are making the most of the audience that comes, how can you fault them for that. It must work. We barely managed to make it through the tour before bolting a few minutes early to go to the organ concert. Once the parents with restless toddlers and babies left it was enjoyable.

After the concert, we hightailed it out of Temple Square with our heads down and went to lunch. We ate at Lamb’s Grill, the oldest restaurant in Utah. Still at the same location. It was a big and art deco-styled place. Clay had a Cobb salad with a Jackson Hole Orange Cream Soda and I had a Philly cheesesteak with house made chips. We shared a famous rice pudding. It seems that Utah has a high per capita diet of Jell-O products and they like their puddings. It is my understanding that the old restaurants cook their puddings the old fashioned way and don’t use Jell-O though. We walked through City Creek shopping center to see the dancing fountains in front of Nordstrom then on through to Harmons Market. I had read that it is an old independent downtown grocery. It was new. It was very appealing and we each had a small gelato before leaving for our hard slog back uphill.

When we got up 29 stairs to the Inn on the Hill’s front porch, Clay stopped and sat and I went in and got cold drinks and iced brownies to have while we watched a storm rolling across in the distance before snowcapped peaks. In doing so, I asked for glasses of ice and instead got offered a bucket of ice and 2 paper coffee cups. OK. Now we have a little ice anyway!  Clay is napping now. We plan to get in the car to drive out of downtown for dinner at Ruth’s Diner. It is out in Emigration Canyon. It is the 2^nd oldest restaurant in SLC and has famous chocolate malt pudding. I’m looking forward to that! If I go to sleep now, I won’t get up and go out to dinner. So, I may go down and play some billiards.

Well, I am awful at billiards so I came back up and rousted Clay out of bed. He beat me soundly 3 out of 3. We left for dinner after 5pm. We got to Ruth’s Diner just in time to get a table, it seemed. We got seated in the original trolley car section. It was cool. The floor was slanted though and the aisle between the tables was very narrow and it was loud in there. The space was so narrow that when the guy at the table across the aisle from us pounded his Tabasco bottle on the table to get it going, that it shot up in the air and several drops of hot sauce landed on Clay. He looked around startled and wiped off his head. Then I pointed out the big red splotch on his shirt! He loves that shirt. Neither water nor a Tide stick got it out, but he washed it with Woolite at the Inn and got it out. Whew! He was just glad a drop didn’t hit him in the eye. They had outdoor seating but it was still raining a little and that was too risky. Clay had a local draft, a salad and Cajun spiced trout. I had a salad and chicken fried steak. We each had a chocolate malt pudding. Clay was glad he had ordered his own and I really liked it too, but I was thinking I was so stuffed that I wished we were sharing. We filled the gas tank and washed the windshield on the way back to the Inn so we’re ready to go tomorrow. We also made sure we parked in the upper guest parking area off Hillside. That is a level entrance to the first floor of the Inn on the Hill and requires only 21 steps!

Tomorrow, we drive to see Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake and Golden Spike, where the transcontinental railroads met. Then we cut through Idaho on our way to Grand Teton National Park. We’ll be the next 2 nights at Signal Mountain Lodge. Clay just read from the Antelope Island State Park website that they have a plague of biting gnats right now that are immune to bug spray and that if you visit you should wear mesh netting. We decided we’d just go and not get out of the car or open the windows. We’ll see how much we can see like that! Hopefully, we won’t get a car full when we have to open the car to pay our entrance fee! Fingers crossed this is the only place with a bug problem too!

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Zion to Salt Lake City

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Thursday, May 22, 2014



Clay is really sleeping well on this trip. He goes to sleep about 8 to 8:30pm and he is sometimes still asleep when I get up around 6 to 6:30am. He finally told me about his rash. He told me days ago that he had a rash and did I have anything for that. I offered him cortisone cream and Benadryl spray but he didn’t want those. I offered him Gold Bond powder & I know he’s been using it based on the bathroom floors. A day or so ago he asked again if I had something else for a rash and he took the cortisone cream. Last night he told me that he had figured out the rash. He said it started after he sat on one of those pit toilets at a rest area crossing the Rockies. He said that he had a perfect circle of rough red skin like a burn in a circle around his butt and upper thighs. He said he thought he must have sat on a toilet seat that had been cleaned with lye or some other caustic and burned him a ring of fire. I won’t even start on what came next…. Honestly, at his age and doesn’t know better than to put his bare ass on a strange toilet seat.

We were up a bit later today since we have a fairly short drive to SLC and no plans. We went to breakfast and Clay ate cold cereal, a hard-boiled egg and pastries. I had scrambled eggs with a biscuit and sausage gravy and a piece of cinnamon raisin toast. We got packed up and checked out by about 9am. We headed west on 9 to 17 then north on I-15 at exit 27. The speed limit was 80mph and there was little traffic. We got off at exit 40 for the Kolob Canyon portion of Zion National Park and spent an hour or more. We checked in at the Visitor’s Center. (We have definitely gotten our money’s worth out of Clay’s 2 Senior Access passes. Imagine what a good deal just buying one pass would have been.) We drove the scenic drive all the way to the end and took the moderate (not easy!) Timber Creek Overlook Trail to the end, where you could see the north rim of the Grand Canyon in the distance. It was very different from Zion Canyon and we were glad we stopped. We were back on I-15 by about 11:30am. We stopped for a picnic lunch at a rest area near exit 82. I was a nice place for a freeway exit. The weather is beautiful, dry and breezy with hardly a cloud in the sky. Highs probably in the 80s. Oh, btw it was not the Western Family yogurt giving me the gas because it was all quiet in the car this afternoon. Inexplicable.

We ran into heavy traffic just south of Provo and it lasted all the way to the Inn on the Hill, our home for the next 2 nights. We got here about 4pm. It is in a beautiful large old brick house on the corner of North State Street and 200 North. It is about 2 blocks south of the capital building and about 2 blocks north of Temple Square. It is on the side of a very steep hill from Temple Square at the bottom to the Capital Building at the top. Once we got our room key, we hauled our bags up about 100 stairs. Not really, it was really only about 50 or so stairs. Really. We signed up for breakfast at 8:15am tomorrow. They only served a maximum of 4 people every 15 minutes or so and you have to sign up for a time slot the day before. The girl who checked us in was some kind of a dingbat. She seemed confused and couldn’t answer the simplest questions and she swore SLC’s blocks are shorter than the average city’s when the fact is well known that they are longer.



So, 2 other things. Clay had decided after drinking a lot of Utah beers that he wanted to have dinner at Red Rock Brewing Company. We asked about getting there. We should be in a free bus district and so should the RRBC but she never offered a word about how we might use the free public transit. She did finally give us the correct address for the RRBC and tell us it was too far to walk. Since Clay was planning on drinking we were certainly not driving. The other thing was that we knew the Mormon Tabernacle Choir on Thursday nights from 7:30pm to 9:30pm has free open to the public rehearsals, but only when they are in town and not touring. You have to check to make sure they will be open in advance. So, this seemed like common information to ask of a tourism/hospitality professional. She had no idea what I was talking about. Said she had never heard anything about that. I insisted, so she came back and said she had called and they would be open tonight, though the tabernacle had been closed all week for a recording they were making. She said they advised early arrival.

Clay changed from shorts and a T to a shirt and jeans. We set off. It was a hot downhill walk to Red Rock. We thought we may be a little lost on the way and people wearing name badges were happy to offer assistance. I hate to say it, but I was more than a little creeped out by Salt Lake City and its inhabitants. It wound up being maybe 8 -10 (SLC) blocks to get there and the Temple Square will be on the way back to the Inn. We got to Red Rock about 5:30pm. Clay lured me here with the promise of premises brewed root beer for me. He had 5 3-oz. beers and I think he liked all of them to varying degrees. (According to our waiter Utah had recently passed a law outlawing beer samplers or flights, though you could order up to 3 3-oz. beers at a time to create your own. Go figure.) I had the root beer and it was nasty. You could have a refill for 50 cents and they also brewed their own cream soda so I got it too. I didn’t like it either and Clay thought it was nasty as well. We each ordered a 10-inch wood fired pizza and shared an Italian sausage and a pepperoni. The pizzas were good. We got to Temple Square about 7pm and entered at the West Visitor’s center. We stopped and asked for a map, about guided tours for tomorrow and about tonight’s rehearsal. She confirmed what we already knew but added where to enter at door 11. We wandered a bit and found a sign taped up saying due to recording running long, the rehearsal would open to the public at 8pm. We sat on a bench once and 2 missionaries proselytized us. They have an app and you can read or listen to a free Book of Mormon, if you're interested. We got up and kept moving after that until we were stuck standing in line at about 10 of 8pm as directed. They also explained the bag check and security screening procedures we would have to go through once they opened the door. At 8pm with maybe 500 people lined up they came through announcing that it would be 8:30pm. At 8:45pm we walked up and looked in the window and could see and hear them still singing and playing and figured that there was no way they would open a public rehearsal at all tonight and we walked uphill home as night fell. We got back in the room at the Inn about 9:10pm. Disappointing! 

Our Inn on the Hill room is Zion on the 2^nd floor of the Inn on the Hill. It is west-facing, but has a big bay on the west facing side so you can see the Temple and downtown a block or so to the south. It is a smallish room with a double bed. Good thing we are accustomed to that! It has a gas log fireplace and a big bathroom with a giant Jacuzzi tub with a shower over it. It has dangerously high sides again. When we arrived in the room there was a small silver box with a silver bow on it on the bed. When we opened it we found 4 paper envelopes with the Inn on the Hill drawings on them with a locally made thin chocolate mint. Very nice touch! That is the first time we have had something like that on this trip. There is no fridge, no ice bucket. They have a snack and cold beverages closet out next the stair landing but it is not the same as keeping a bottle of iced water next to the bed. It will be a long 2 nights here with warm water and no ice cubes and a tiny bed. As I recall when we were booking we had a hard time finding availability and this was a good location and available, so here we are. The older we get the less I think I like B&Bs. We paid $360 to stay here for 2 nights. $40 of that was tax! That included parking, breakfast and sodas and snacks. It was actually a pretty good deal for the location and quality. No real complaints here except for the steep hill and no access to public transportation, but I don't suppose there is anything they can do about that.

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Zion National Park

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Wednesday, May 21, 2014

Okay, maybe I was too rash yesterday. I do kind of like Zion. It has a kind of beauty. I still prefer every one of the parks we saw east of here better and I still think it is badly done, managed and information communicated here. But, I see the good too now.

So, we were up before the sun again. I guess we still haven’t adjusted to the time difference. We went down to the included breakfast here at the Quality Inn. They had a buffet laid out with scrambled eggs, hard boiled eggs and biscuits and sausage gravy. They also had a waffle iron set up. A guy asked if anyone wanted eggs fried to order and Clay got his 2 over easy so he was happy. I saw the waffle iron was not in use and the steam table was busy so without looking at anything else I made a waffle. I also had a cup of coffee and a cup of awful chemical-tasting yogurt. I have been eating Western Family brand that we’ve been buying at stores and I really like it, but something is giving me awful gas and right now the Western Family yogurt is the number one suspect!

We came back up to the room to brush our teeth. You have to go outdoors and walk around the front of the motel building to get to breakfast, so we had a lot of views around. The low sun was incredible on the colorful rock faces and the brilliant blue, cloudless sky. We had high hopes for the day. Clay had an online weather report that the high would be 69F. (It was very wrong. It was at least 80-something F.) We drove on over to Zion NP to get a parking place a little after 8am. We had our cooler packed with our lunch in the car. We parked near the flagpole and decided to test our legs by taking the Archaeology Trail. It was short, but steep and rough and expected to take 30 minutes. It was cold and though I had a shirt and undershirt on, I didn’t want to have to haul around a jacket, so I was walking quickly trying to warm up. I walked right next to a pair of sleeping mule deer before Clay said from behind me, Debbie, deer. I turned around and saw them right there and squeaked. I scared the bejeezus out of those deer and they both jumped up and then we all froze. I felt bad I ruined their morning and rousted them that way! The trail was a disappointment as all we saw was a sign that said there used to be a food storage building there from ancient peoples. There was nothing up there now except a sign. We walked back to the flagpole, used the restrooms and waited. Close to 8:45am, the appointed time, Ranger Kim arrived and took roll. Everyone that was on the roll and arrived prior to 9am made it on the shuttle for the Ride with a Ranger, including the guy that just walked up at 9am. That was good.

We enjoyed the escorted ride up canyon. We made 3 stops and some of them were in places were the regular shuttles don’t stop. We also stopped at the Grotto. From the bus we saw deer and a turkey and some rock climbers on a distant cliff face. We saw hikers up on Angels Landing. Ranger Kim gave lots of good information and asked and answered lots of questions. I was really glad we got to do it. It was advertised as a 2 hour tour that began and ended at the Visitor’s Center. In point of fact, it ended at the last shuttle stop at the Temple of Sinawava. Kim offered anyone who wanted a ride with no stops or narration back to the Visitors Center. We decided to stay at the Temple of Sinawava and take the Riverside Walk. It was described as easy and lasting an hour and a half. Those things were probably true. We walked slowly to the end of the paved trail where you have to walk through the Virgin River to continue onto the Narrows. It was a beautiful and easy walk. It was 2.2 miles roundtrip. We were ready for lunch when we finished. We caught the next shuttle and headed to the Visitor’s Center. On the shuttle ride back down canyon, we saw another turkey in the road and this one had over a dozen fluffy little yellowish chicks with her! Sorry no photos of course, these dang buses. Prepare though for photo overload below. The Riverside Walk was extremely photogenic!   

We ate at a shady bench near the Visitor’s Center, used the facilities and refilled the water bottle. We got on the next shuttle and headed for the Zion Lodge stop. We walked the trail to the Lower Emerald Pool. It was a little steep, but mostly paved. It was 1.2 miles and took about an hour. Our reward was soft serve ice cream cones at the outdoor café at the Zion Lodge after. We used the facilities again and head back down canyon on the next shuttle. We got off at Canyon Junction. We had seen the signs at the History Museum stop for the Pa’rus Trail. This trail goes between the Visitor’s Center and Canyon Junction. It looked like on the map that you could also start or stop in the middle at the History Museum. So, we decided to start at Canyon Junction and if we were done at the Museum, we’d catch the shuttle to the Visitor’s Center. This didn’t quite work out. The return to the Museum from the trail was not as well marked as the entrance to the trail from the museum and when we did find it, the museum was no longer in sight. It seemed that the Visitor’s Center couldn’t be that much further a walk, so we walked the whole thing in the blazing sun. It is supposed to be 1.75 miles. It felt longer. It is also named Pa’rus because it is a Paiute word to describe the Virgin River and the trail is advertised as riverside. Not quite. I mean we crossed it on bridges several times and you could walk down to it several times, but for most of the trail, you wouldn’t know that there was a river there. It was more like a paved desert walk. We were hot, tired and weary when we finally finished at about 5pm. We got in the car and drove back to the Quality Inn. A lot of photos!  

We put our feet up for a while and then set off for dinner. We decided that we would first look at the menu at The Spotted Dog Café across the street. Their website says they serve a seasonal menu so it changes daily. We were planning to take the free shuttle to the other end of Springdale for pizza if there was nothing we wanted. The other thing was that the reviews online complained the Spotted Dog was too pricey. We looked at the menu outside and then asked to be seated. It was hotter inside than out, so we asked to sit on the front porch. There were hummingbirds out there! It was excellent food and no more pricey than our Mexican food last night. So we were satisfied. Clay had a Polygamy Porter and BBQ short ribs with fries. I had a blackened flatiron steak with fries. They were both good and the thin crispy fries were excellent. We passed on dessert because they were displayed on a tray tableside and were priceless. I was just too tired to be hungry and felt like I had had too much sugar the past week anyway. We walked right back to the room. 

Clay took a shower and said he ran out of hot water right away and it never came back. We are both praying this is a temporary problem and the hot water is back tomorrow morning. If not I will be having a very bad day!

Tomorrow, we check out and drive on to Salt Lake City. We spend the next 2 nights at a B&B called Inn on the Hill. 

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Zion National Park Eastern Approach

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Tuesday, May 20, 2014

We were up with the sun again. No nice sunrises here surprisingly. It was another cloudless day. Breezy and cool in the morning and breezy and warm in the afternoon. We had more or less a repeat of breakfast at Clarke’s. We packed up and turned in the key cards and set off again west on Utah 12. The Red Canyon was still lovely. We stopped and took more pictures. Clay saw a cottontail cross the road but we didn’t see any other animals today except birds and lizards. We stopped at a couple of viewpoints we had missed yesterday. One had a sign about pronghorn, but we didn’t see the herd it was referencing. It was interesting though. It said “pronghorn are confounded by fences”. Evidently even though they are fast and can jump far, they will not get a running start and leap over a fence. They will try to wriggle under or through it.

Zion entry fees. You can see that these standard entry fees could really add up. Thank goodness Clay is old! Even though we have had to buy 2 Senior passes due to not having one on us in Hawaii, we are still way ahead on the savings over regular entry prices! The tunnel escort fee is for large vehicle that require the longer tunnel to become one-way traffic only. There must be some real money made here on these fees!

We headed down Utah 89 and ran into some road work with the road only open one lane. Good thing we had a short drive today and were in no hurry. This part of the drive was not very scenic, (though on the map it has the same scenic byway designation as 12 and 24) but it was short. We turned right on Utah 9 (which was designated scenic and was very scenic) and were soon waiting in a 15 minute or so line to pay (show our pass) to enter Zion National Park. We had decided to try for the Canyon Overlook Trail entering Zion NP from the east on Utah 9. When we got there we found no available parking and a long line to get through the tunnel. There is more parking in the lot on the other side of the street but they don’t allow left turns so even though traffic only moves about every 10 minutes, you can’t get there. Oh, well. We missed that one. Bad news. Good news is that we are both nearly paralyzed from our crazy climbing hikes yesterday and beyond the views, we weren’t really looking forward to it. How sad is that?

The entry drive on this approach was crazy scenic and an engineering marvel. We went through 2 tunnels and one of them had S-curves in it and went on for over a mile. It had amazing large open windows along the right side sporadically. The traffic goes through there in one way bursts as large and wide vehicles cannot fit through as 2-way traffic. It was spectacular and for us the rest of the park was kind of blah. They don’t allow you to drive personal cars on the scenic drive up and down Zion Canyon during most of the busiest parts of the year. They also have very little parking. So, you are supposed to get yourself to a shuttle stop and let them drive you around. They use propane buses pulling another bus-sized vehicle with the same seating setup. Visibility is limited. It is about an 80-minute roundtrip from the Visitor’s Center.

We drove the part where private cars are allowed to the Visitor’s Center to try to sign up for a Ride with a Ranger at 9am tomorrow. There was no parking, so Clay let me out and I got behind about 30 other people at the Information desk. Beside it was the Zion Lodge desk and the 2 guys there were working the line trying to get anyone to come over to their side of the desk behind their vacancy sign and ask for rooms. I was just about fuming by then. We had tried several times months ago to get a room for even one night at the park lodge and their booking website always said they had no availability for even one of our nights. I just have to say now that everything here was poorly done compared to the other parks we’ve just come from. The scenery is disappointing compared to Arches or Bryce and the crowds are unbelievable. Why would anyone come here and be herded like cattle, when the other parks are so superior? Maybe it is just me but I can’t find anything good to say. (On further reflection, the red road pavement is nice.) Zion is just not for us. Maybe if we were rock climbers we’d be in heaven. But as it is we don’t like it. Even the information in the paper handout, which is nameless, is not organized and presented clearly. To boot, the newsprint smears! Unlike The Hoodoo from Bryce that they asked you to carry at all times and I did and it never smeared and it was useful and not just incomplete and confusing. Anyway, end of rant for now. I finally got my turn at the desk to be told that we could be the first 2 on the waitlist for the Ride with a Ranger at 9am tomorrow. She told me to be at the flagpole outside at 8:45am and that we could probably go. So that is the plan for tomorrow. Clay found a parking place while he drove around waiting for me. We visited the shop and went out to drive to the history museum and see the 22-minute Zion film. I thought there would be better parking there because they did not have a sign on the road saying parking full like the visitor’s center did. I was wrong. We drove around and around and finally drove back to the visitor’s center and found a spot after only about one circuit.

So, we got our lunch out of the car and ate it in the shade. Clay poured about half his bottle of Diet Coke on my lap, legs and feet. He just bent over and poured it out on me. I don’t think either of us can explain how exactly that happened. We went back to the car and I changed into a clean and dry pair of jeans while we fended off the circling cars. Then we went out and took the 2^nd shuttle that came and went with space on it. We watched the film and read the signs around the building and took in the landscapes before boarding the next shuttle. We were so overwhelmed by the noise and people and glaring sun and blowing wind, etc. that we just stayed on for the full round trip and decided to call it a day. Staying on for the round trip is a euphemism. We actually had to get off and walk to the bus at the front of the line to continue the full round trip.

We left the park and drove less than a mile to the Quality Inn. There is only one main street through Springdale and it goes right into the park. The town of Springdale and the National Park ask that people parallel park at the curbs of the road in Springdale and take Springdale’s free shuttle to the edge of the park, walk through and pay to enter the park and then take the park shuttle from the Visitor’s Center. Really. And I assure you that all of that is more complicated than it actually sounds. Springdale is basically like a giant parking lot for Zion National Park. I don’t know what it is like. I’ve never experienced anything like it. I don’t understand it. I don’t like it. I am tired and cranky. I should just go to bed now.

We got checked in to the Quality Inn and were told to park where we had already parked in one of the 8 spaces right outside the lobby. Really? 8 parking places for a Quality Inn motel? She put us in 228, the first room at the top of the stairs. Again! Top floor in a building with no elevator. There is a spectacular view from the 2^nd story outdoor walkway, but there are no windows out that way. Our view from 228 is of the breakfast restaurant’s roof, vent fan and evaporative cooler. If you look out to the sides past all that there would be more stellar landscapes, cliffs, etc. It is a good-sized and attractive room with tragic drapes. It has a king bed and a sofa, a table and 2 chairs. TV, fridge, microwave, coffee maker, iron and board. The bathroom is large with a single sink and shower over tub. No nightlight. Sensing a pattern? It is all clean and good except for those drapes. The sun must just be brutal here. Though the other thing I don’t like is the 5 small square bed pillows they have marching across the head of the bed. I mean come on, pillows should be rectangular and how are 2 people supposed to share 5 pillows anyway. The mattress is really comfortable! We paid $264 for 2 nights and it included parking, breakfast and free Wi-Fi.



You have to go to the front desk with your ice bucket to request ice from whoever is at the desk. There is a campground behind and attached to this Quality Inn. Clay overheard some women checking in and having the shower tokens explained to them. The desk clerk gave them each a 6-minute token and told them to plan wisely before getting in the shower. She told them the timer runs whether the water is turned on or not, so get organized first. What the heck? Now Clay is worried that our shower will cut off after 6 minutes! (It didn’t. I should have been selling showers here! I told Clay if I’d been with those camping women, I would have asked for a room and rented out my shower to the others.)

We commiserated and researched all afternoon trying to figure out what we’d like to try to do tomorrow. Based on getting on the 2 hour Ride with a Ranger tour in the morning, we made a plan. We’ll see. Our plans haven’t meant much so far here. Clay also researched where to have dinner and buy lunch groceries. There is 1 grocery store here. You can imagine the prices without competition.

We walked down the main street away from the park. There were hundreds or maybe thousands of whirligigs for sale! Is it always this windy here? I am assuming yes because otherwise there is no explanation for the plethora of whirligigs.

We went into a restaurant called Wildcat Willies, it had at least 3 signs outside about its world famous bumbleberry pie, so we went in. (We had never heard of bumbleberry and had to look it up later. It turns out I've been making a cobbler for years that could probably wear the bumbleberry name.) We were seated with menus and both noticed there was no bumbleberry pie for dessert. When the waitress came and asked for our drink order, I asked her about the missing pie. She said they don’t serve bumbleberry pie, but if we want some we can go out to the adjoining gift shop and get one. NO. We got up and left instead. What is wrong with this place?

We walked across the street to Oscar’s Café that Clay had read about on Trip Advisor. Famous fish tacos, which are not on the menu. So, it was Mexican-inspired food. Clay ate all his pork chile verde enchiladas so either he was really hungry or liked it. I did not like mine. I ordered the black bean burrito with grilled chicken breast in it. The waitress and I had a long conversation about how the menu said the burrito started with black beans and rice and salsa and I did not want any salsa in there. She said they would leave it out then. She said I might not like the smothering chile verde sauce and I agreed and she offered to bring it in a bowl on the side. I agreed. Then when I got it and cut it open, it was filled with what looked like onions, chiles and tomatoes. I was picking them out when Clay pointed out to her that it looked to him like there was salsa inside my burrito. She said no, that is the bell peppers and onions we use to marinate the chicken breast. Really? After all that conversation about not wanting salsa etc., she didn’t think I would be bothered by peppers and onions in there! And I paid extra to have that grilled chicken added. I could have just had it with the beans and rice and it would have been perfect. Still not having a good day.  

We haven’t even been away for a week and we are already miserable. We really are too old for this. I am hoping it is just Zion that we don’t like and it will be better when we leave. We’ll see.

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Bryce and Red Canyon

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Monday, May 19, 2014

We were early to bed last night and late to rise this morning. We had a plan after some map & Internet searching. I woke up with drum head again. We took 2 of our breakfast vouchers and walked over to Clarke’s Restaurant for our complimentary breakfast. We just beat the crowd and walked right in. There was a line out the door when we left! Anyway, with the vouchers you get a special menu and you can order any 4 of the bulleted items. Coffee is an item. Juice is an item. 1 egg is an item. 2 pieces of toast, 2 pancakes, 2 slices of bacon, etc. I saved my coffee for the room! Clay had 2 eggs, bacon and 2 pieces of toast. 4 for him. I had 1 egg, breakfast potatoes, bacon and pancakes. I had a lot of potatoes and 2 big pancakes so Clay had half of each. It worked out to be a good hearty breakfast for us both.

We came back to the room and packed our cooler with our lunch picnic and headed out. Today was cooler than yesterday and completely cloudless unlike yesterday with heavy clouds all day. All the hoodoos and cliffs on the way to Mossy Cave looked so much more brilliantly colored in the brighter lower sun with the bright blue sky. We hiked both sides of Mossy Cave and saw the little spring coming out of the cave as well as the waterfall from the Mormon settlers' hand dug 10-mile long irrigation canal from the East Fork of the Sevier River to irrigate Tropic. It was a great little walk.

We decided to go directly back into Bryce NP and revisit Bryce Point in the cloudless morning as well as tackle Inspiration Point. We stopped first at the Visitor’s center and got our “I hiked the hoodoos” badge pins after providing our photographic evidence that we qualified. That was cool. I’m not sure I could see a huge difference in the lighting on the landscape at Bryce Point though. The views from the ever higher, multiple viewpoints at Inspiration Point though were inspirational! It was worth the climb. 

Next we drove past Bryce on Utah 12 (which we will take to Zion NP tomorrow anyway!) to visit Red Canyon of the Dixie National Forest. It is supposed to be spectacular and they have a gift shop with a Smokey the Bear section. I have a thing for Smokey! Always have for as long as I can remember. It is free admission! Can’t go wrong with this one. It was a beautiful drive and was a red canyon. We shopped at the visitors’ center which exceeded expectations for me and got souvenirs and trail maps for Red Canyon.

We ate our picnic lunch and used the restrooms and started hiking. We hiked a loop from the parking lot with 2 trails. We started at the wrong end (it has interpretive signs 1-13 and we started at 13 per the ranger’s advice) of Pink Ledges and then finished off with Hoodoo Trail. Pink Ledges was harder but much more scenic and with more hoodoos than Hoodoo Trail. If you go and why not, it is free and uncrowded unlike the National Parks with similar scenery, ask for “The Interpretive Guide to the Pink Ledges Trail Red Canyon, Utah”.  There is a lot of great information in there. For example, did you know that if you put your nose right up to the cracks in the bark of a Ponderosa pine tree and sniff that you can smell snickerdoodle cookies? No, the guide says it is the hint of vanilla and butterscotch. Who knew? Good thing we just had lunch, ‘cause this made me crave cookies! 

We, or maybe I, got over confident then and selected another trail from the map the ranger had provided. We drove through a pair of tunnels through red rock outcroppings on the way here and there was a short but steep trail that supposedly had a vantage view of both tunnels together. The Tunnel Trail. We must have been crazy. It was crazy. The “trail” was mostly a zigzag switchback climb over a scree field! When we got 253 feet up we found that a tree had grown up to cover the first tunnel! When Clay asked at the visitor’s center about it, the woman showed Clay a photo that had been taken from the vantage point and both tunnels were visible, so he agreed to go to get that photo. That photo must have been taken between 20 and 100 years ago! The consolation was that about 7/8 of the way from the summit on the way back down we found a place where you could actually see both tunnels in their entirety. We managed to get back down safely. Once again, my bacon was saved by those walking sticks. Unfortunately, the tremors were really bad today and I struggled to keep the toes of my right foot flattened out so I could walk at all. The good news was that there were a lot of conveniently placed benches to take a rest and I used almost every one of them.

We got back to Tropic around 4pm and drove all the way through town again checking things out. Cowboy Grill was still closed. As we located The Pizza Place, I noticed the Shiver Shack, a shave ice stand parked at the end of the building and we stopped and got in a long line. Funny! While Clay waited in line, I went in and checked out the Pizza Place menu. It looked like only very thick crust pizza and I don’t like that. Clay didn’t want to go back to Clarke’s though. Oh, based on the endorsement of the guy in line before me, I went with my first choice and got Wedding Cake. It was a vanilla-y. That was good. I think Clay had mango. They were a good snack and really hit the spot for us.

After we got back to the room, I looked out our window and saw that the Cowboy Grill was open. We got on our shoes and walked over. Clay had read about this food truck/trailer online and wanted a hamburger there. We both got burgers, though they served fish and chicken too. We were told that all their sandwiches come with Cowboy Sauce on them. The girl acted like I should know what that is. She described it as a combination of ketchup, mayo and pickles. OK, that was exactly what I had asked for on my burger to begin this revealing conversation. I am sure Clay had not read about Cowboy Sauce coming standard on all sandwiches nor do I think he saw it on their menu. He is not a fan of sauces and likes mustard and onions only on his burgers. I did not see any pickles in the Cowboy Sauce. The burgers were large and fine. I liked it. Clay though seemed disappointed. The fries were ok too but very greasy. We brought the food back to the motel and used a balcony dining table and chairs in the stairwell to eat.

  

After, we went back over to the grocery store and bought picnic supplies for tomorrow’s lunch as well as dessert. We watched The Bourne Legacy on HBO in the room at 7:15pm with our popcorn and desserts. This is the first time we’ve watched TV since before leaving home. When we got up we were both stricken. My calf muscles hurt so badly! Clay said it was all the climbing. I have blisters on both big toes now. Thankfully, we plan to do no hiking tomorrow as we drive to Zion National Park. We have 2 nights at a Quality Inn nearby there in Springdale. We couldn’t get even a single night at the park lodge in Zion.

We had a really great day today. I loved Red Canyon and I’m so glad we had extra time to spend most of a day there. Otherwise, we’d have just driven past and maybe gone in the visitor’s center and hopefully found the Smokey stuff! Well, it is past my bedtime now. So, tomorrow Zion.

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