We parked just at the tunnel exit to hike the short Canyon Overlook Trail. It’s a perfect early morning jaunt and already the day was turning pretty warm.
We stopped for a shot of Checkerboard Mesa on the way out of Zion
We continued through Mt. Carmel Junction onto 89 passing the Glendale Bench Road that we took back in ’04- that was the long, slow route to Bryce. Not this time. We were looking forward to being in Bryce. We arrived around Noon, headed for the North Campground since it was close to the Rim Trail and found a nice tent site at the end of the D loop. We set up our tent, shared one of the wraps with cold beers and noticed the stormy skies approaching.
Decided to check out all the scenic overlooks. The sky made for some nice pictures, and we even had some rain with thunder and lightning! Very fun – we love storms, especially out West where the sky is so big.
Met some very friendly and inquisitive ravens. Spent the rest of the day taking photos at the overlooks and from the Rim Trail
We were pretty hungry so we called the lodge (our campsite is the only place our cell phones worked) for a dinner reservation – no problem. We decide to keep the remaining wrap for tomorrow’s hike and pig out in the restaurant tonight. A nice bottle of wine, red trout for Sharon, sirloin for Peter, share a yummy tiramisu for dessert. The food was really good, and we had great service from a nice guy from upstate NY. We split a bottle of wine with dinner and the altitude really gave it some extra kick.
We headed to Upper Inspiration Point after dinner for some sunset photos. Chatted with some folks about hikes and good photo ops and trip plans. Head to our campsite and an early bedtime. A pretty warm night (60’s) considering we were expecting 40’s-50’s nighttime temps at that elevation (8-9,000 ft). It rained a little overnight, nothing much.