Rambling in Utah - Part 1 (Snow Canyon, Zion, Harvest Host, and Bryce)

Saturday, April 13 found us at Snow Canyon State Park – what a very busy place this is!  It’s a weekend. But first, since we were in a different time zone and we didn’t want to check in too early, we decided to run into St. George and do laundry. That was a first having to download an app to be able to operate the laundry machines!

There are bikes everywhere with awesome trails.  We’re here for just one night and that’s good!  I reserved us a spot with water and electricity. Sometimes when you view a picture of the campsite online, you aren’t getting the whole picture. I will let the pictures speak for themselves. Our neighbor had to pull his slide in while we got ourselves leveled (very unlevel sites). Then we had to arrange ourselves with our slides. Whew! The non -utility sites are beautiful.

Crazy Sites

Our next stop was at Zion National Park, Watchmen Campground. It was fun getting checked in!  We knew the Ranger!  Aaron from back when we volunteered at the Lyndon B. Johnson National Historical Park in Stonewall, Texas. This isn’t the first time we have visited a park and run into rangers we had worked with before.

Zion is Utah’s first National Park. It is known worldwide for it’s spectacular cliff and canyon landscape. The immense scale, sheer cliffs, deep alcoves and narrow canyons are magnificent. We had great views from wherever we sat at in our campsite. We enjoyed riding our bikes to viewpoints. You either have to take a shuttle or ride your bike to see things.

Beautiful way to explore - on the bikes!

Springtime has everything green, the water in the Virgin River is flowing good and there are wildflowers. It's a good start to our 4th week on the road!

The merging of a creek with the Virgin River

Cold, drizzly morning when we left. Beautiful!

What can I say about Zion? What other words can I choose besides “beautiful, breathtaking, awe inspiring, God’s masterpiece?

The Virgin River

Just a tourist!

Campsite friends

We were due for an oil change so while we were in the St. George area, we scheduled service at the Ford Dealership and got that done. I scheduled our first Harvest Host visit. Fisher Family Farm, outside of Hurricane, Utah. Despite a little rain shower when we arrived and some cold, we were greeted by the very friendly owner Payton. His daughter Lily stopped by later to give us a tour of the farm. She was cute as could be! It’s my kind of place with greenhouses, growing flowers and plants, raised garden beds, chickens, cows, a lamb, goats. There’s a lot going on here. That’s what’s cool about using Harvest Hosts – you can find some fun places to camp. You have to be able to boondock though.

Parked on their gravel driveway

Lily, our tour guide for the farm.

Tuesday, April 16 we drove into Bryce Canyon National Park.  I think this is our 7^th time to visit here.  The campgrounds this time of the year were first come, first serve. We got to the park around 10:30 and were able to snag a nice site.

It was such a different experience as there was still snow in the campground and at the scenic points. (It also got down to 31 at night.) Pictures don’t always do it right, but I will try! 

The red rocks. The hoodoos. The wind in the tall pine trees. The birds chirping. It’s high elevation was such a nice change from the desert we have been in. It’s magical! Maybe a little bit extraterrestrial. Many hoodoos, odd shaped pillars of rock, and horseshoe amphitheaters are found here.

For those of us that leave where there's no snow, it seems there was still a lot here.

So cool to see the scenery in a different way. Inspiration Point

Hoodoos

This view was amazing in person - very horseshow shaped.

Good ole Rambler!!!

Wednesday morning, we were packing up to leave for our next destination and dang the luck. A flat tire. Brand new tires. The culprit was the valve stem cap became loose. Thankful that we weren’t on the side of the road dealing with that. Capable Ron took care of it.

He got to use some of those tools he packed for the "just in case".

Leaving out the tunnel.

I know it's a picture overload sometimes. But you see.....at the end of the trip, this blog is how I make a scrapbook.  I send it to the printer and it comes back in a bound book.

Stay tuned as we continue truckin' across Utah!