Day Three of Spring break...... Park two.... hikes #4 and #5. When you have boys.... life is all about stats.... (as you can see :)
Bryce Canyon Nat'l Park, IMHO, the prettiest of all 4 parks we visited. Hike #4 was also the best hike of my life.... even though I FEARED for my life practically the entire time.... the hike begins at 8,000 feet elevation..... when we reached the canyon floor, we were descended well over 1000 feet... so think about about it.... 2 miles on a steep downhill grade on solid ICE... I was slipping and sliding all over that trail, straight scared out of my boots. Usually I am much braver on hikes.... but I guess I am starting to feel my age. When we reached the bottom I literally sat down and thanked the Dear Lord for sparing my life!! Unfortantely, I did not have the foresight to pray or think about what goes downhill must come back uphill.....
here's the beginning of the trail at 8,000 feet in what looks like the middle of winter but actually is spring time.... Those boys... trail blazing and leaving me to eat their dust (snow dust)
hey I though we were headed down hill????
Lord hear my prayer!!!
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So what's the game plan? This is hard to see..... but the red path is solid ice - the little light you see behind the tree trunk is where we are headed.....
Now - this is where I had to dig deep in my inner strength to manage the last climb of this hike......WE literally climbed 200 feet in about 300 to 400 yards..... major switchbacks on SOLID ice... I needed an ice pick, to say the least. Ok - so enough about me... If I was slipping and sliding all over the place can you imagine the kids??? While trail blazer Q had virtually no problem.... Trail Blazer Marz needed some help.... help? are you serious....? I can't even hold on to this darn piece of ice that keeps sliding me backwards... DH to the rescue.... He had to carry Marz up this part.
this is looking down once we made it up... the picture does this climb no justice....the switchbacks go behind some of these rock and the red dirt is seriously solid ice. We came out to that black space dead center bottom of the hill.
I will say once I made it to the top - I was pretty happy to say OK spring break is over (hahaha) I look like yuck... but I had to take a picture because to this day I still can't believe I actually made it out of that Navajo Loop - I highly recommend this hike - just only in summer - We fell in love with Bryce Canyon and I know we will be back..... just maybe when it heats up a little bit :)
Natural Bridge
Second hike to a Mossy cave and waterfall that happened to be frozen solid! cool!
Day three - mission accomplished - boys were wiped out (right along with us) we were sawing logs by 8 pm that night and we got a pretty late start the next morning.... unfortunately the only thing this part of Utah does not have bragging rights on is how to make a good pot of coffee. It was tough getting things going in the morning.....
stayed tuned for part 3.....
I remember those switchbacks well. But we did do them in summer time. But you're so very fortunate to see Bryce with the sprinkling of snow - I'd love to go back to see the snow (but I will pack my ice pick and yak-trax!)
ReplyDeleteOops - I haven't been keeping up with your blog.Your Utah travel log is great!Your writing makes me feel like I'm there (I WAS there several years ago - in the spring). All the parks are stunning but I found Brice the most facinating. Terry and I talk often about going back. Wonderful photos! The boys look like there are having fun!! xoxo,Grammy K
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