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.
Photos
Photos
