Super 8 Motel Beaver

... of horseshoe shaped canyons filled with amazing rock formations called hoo-doos. There are various "stop-offs" at points along the main road through the park and we stopped off and admired the views at most of them. <br><br>At one of our final ones, there was a couple standing off the path in an area which was clearly marked as out of bounds due to the park services trying to re-cultivate the vegetation there (no doubt previously trampled on). We made some ...

... waere eigentlich verboten: 100 Dollar Strafe!) =) Chapter 19: Bryce National Park 27. May 2008 Amazing! No other place amazed us more than Bryce Canyon. We gazed at it from the various viewingpoints and shared our very tasty chipmunks (psst that's forbidden: 100 Dollar penalty!) =)

Short day driving today. My eyes are bagged. I am where I planned to be when I mapped out my return home. Surprise. Surprise. When I left Vegas this morning I decided to drive to Provo, another 250 kms further. But I know how to read the signs now. It was time to stop. That's It! That's All! PS. The ICE show was amazing last night. Third row, center stage. But that wasn't hard to get. It wasn't a sold out show.

Day 7 Mum's Birthday, please dont miss me too much mum and dont worry I will have a drink for you. (oh did we drink for u that day lol) We had a 5 hr drive, we set up camp and a few of us had a horse back ride. I was really nervous but wanted to do most things that are offered. My horse was called Fonzie, it was amazing going round the Canyon and every now and then the horses went into a little trot (normally followed by ...

... and we did a 4 hr hike of the Canyon . This is my fav one of all. It was so interesting with loads of twistes and turns and ups and downs. Everyone else was just fded up of the hike by this point and it was tiring but so worth it i think. U wait til u see the pics.

... up and down the Strip numerous times, it was fairly evident that we were going to be dead tired. We were able to get out of the Las Vegas area easily. But we missed the city glow. We got through Arizona and then past Zion national park. It would've been nice to see that area during the day, but we wanted to go as far as possible that night. We ended up near Parowan, UT. It was one of the few lit rest areas in UT. As always, we just reclined the seats in ...

... much thinner opening than the rest of the canyon). Everything in this park is picturesque. The Virgin River runs through the entire park and the two campgrounds (South and Watchman) are situated on either side of it. After I had lunch (leftovers from Subway), I self-registered for a campsite in Watchman campground (South was closed) at $16/night. The campsites lack privacy but I am less than 100 yards from the river. Plus, there are hook-ups ...

Only one more night to stay in the Bates Motel, sorry Travelodge. Last night was definitely the coldest of the trip so far, there was actually a little bit of snow on the ground and our car when we woke up this morning. Also we could see that the mountains in the distance had received a fresh sprinkling of snow. Luckily as we braved the same mountain road that we drove over the other day, the snow ploughs had been out in force again. Using our frequent user National Park ...

... moment was seeing Lynne walk over a very narrow and creaking bridge, which crossed a knee tremblingly high height. Still the view was definitely worth risking our lives for, allowing us to look back over the canyon we'd driven up earlier in the day (and seeing just how winding the road had been). Sitting there in the blazing sun and not seeing a cloud in the sky, made me think once again just how lucky I was to be on this trip ...

... we began the three hour trip back to Healdsburg. We took a different route on the return journey and this time failed to get lost, thereby saving two hours. The most notable town we passed along the road was St Helena, though we did drive through Lodi again. Before finally arriving home we stopped at the Luther Burbank Memorial Gardens and examined the many hybrid flowers created by this nineteenth century gardening genius. The long trip home was made ...