Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah

Our time at Mystic Hot Springs was great. We managed to get some serious weeding done in exchange for free camping and use of the hot springs. The girls especially liked the cooler, shallower pool that was designed with kids in mind. Meanwhile, the warmer, deeper adjacent pool seemed to uncurl hidden knots in Doug and Denise. A few travelers had suggested we include Capitol Reef National Park in our southern Utah itinerary. We had initially planned to skip it in favor of more time at Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks. Our 9-month anniversary of being on the road fell on Memorial Day (May 25) so we elected to spend 1 night at Capitol Reef National Park and take it easy. To our surprise and delight, a "feature" inside the park was an historic cottage that sold homemade fruit pies - in keeping with the tradition of those hardy (and arguably quite insane) Mormon families that carved a fruit orchard and farming land out of a harsh, barren desert environment that is today's Capitol Reef. The park is beautiful because of the fruit orchards -- a soothing and mellow green in the stark redness of the hard rock canyon walls all around -- where the campgrounds are located. We splurged on 4 small pies and munched happily as we reflected on our last month since being in Grand Canyon and hiking 1.5 miles down the Bright Angel trail below the south rim. An early night to bed was matched with an early start as we headed out of Capitol Reef toward Bryce Canyon at 8am this morning. While a relatively short driving distance it took us a good 4-5 hours to reach Bryce Canyon. Our scenic journey took us over 9,600 foot mountain passes where quaking Aspen trees intersperse with pine and open meadows are carved with clear running brooks, before plummeting once again into dry desert canyons along roads that offered little shoulder and steep drop-offs on either side. Along our route we stopped in at the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and were surprised with the strong science focus of this park. In what has become an almost reflexive reaction both the girls took up the challenge of completing a Junior Ranger equivalent package and are now Junior Scientists of this great national monument. Bryce Canyon greeted us with a warm afternoon and a pleasant sprinkle provided by nearby thunderstorms. Because of high elevation we might dip down to freezing temperatures overnight. But tomorrow we plan to do a morning hike -- along the rim and into the canyon -- in hopefully 55-65F sunshine.