Grand Staircase, Bryce, Zion & Adventures With Cousin Barney

9/12/10 Torrey, Utah- The Sandcreek Campground. This was the chicken coop next to our place! We had chickens, horses, and a ranch on this couple owned place. We got a "camping cabin" which was the first of 3 nights of staying at these type. They are 10 x 12 log cabins with a bed or bunk, mattress, nightstand, lamp and heater. Since I had come down with the "cold virus" and the prediction of lows in the 30's this was a good option! This area was the "Robber's Roost" where the outlaws used to hide out- Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid! Mark visited with the other motorcyclists that were there. Two of the guys were from Port Townsend! The one next to us had a sister that had lived in Mt. Vernon. Talk about a small world. Again, we got more hints of places to go tomorrow.

9/13/10 Sunrise on the hills behind our campground. The colors of the sky and hills are exquisite.

9/13/10 The Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument. A vast area of land that is southeast of Bryce Canyon and encompasses more land than the other National Forests. The hills just "stair stepped" along the landscape and amongst the farms.

More of the Grand Staircase- there were some hay and alfalfa fields, cattle, horse and mostly sagebrush. Warm days continue and cold evenings at this altitude. The Dixie National Forest borders this area, too. We had fun traversing some of the curvy, non guarded roadways!

9/13/10 Ruby's RV Camp Cabins at Bryce Canyon City. Stirring up some gourmet scrambled eggs and cheese to make breakfast burritos for dinner! You have to improvise when there is just a "campstore" to buy your groceries at. We even had a chance to swim in the pool here and get a good nights sleep "inside" before enjoying Bryce Canyon tomorrow.

9/14/10 The entrance to Bryce Canyon. As you can see there was a fire and the firefighters were all around. I wasn't sure if we should head in but come to find out it was a "prescribed burn" to get rid of the underbrush. The smoke got really thick in the town we had been in at the base so were glad we weren't staying another night.

The Bryce Amphitheatre area. The unique red rock spires formed a grand view. We picnicked at one of the lookouts and visited with other tourists. We have noticed that so many of the visitors are from other countries- especially European ones. Some of them had come over and rented motorcycles and a lot were in the "Cruise America" RV's!

60 million years of geology showing off the formations of Bryce Canyon. These magnificent limestone, sandstone, and other rock went on for miles. There were some temples, pillars, domes and spires all at 8000-9300 feet. The spires are called hoodoos and the color changes are from the iron oxides and manganese oxides. We really enjoyed this canyon.

A good example of the color changes in Bryce. We didn't do much hiking around because of the heat, time and our "health". I did manage to go out on a few viewing rocks but not down with the donkey led excursions!

Top of the world! Mark taking in the sites of Bryce Canyon. This was probably the most populated canyon we visited this week.

Leaving Bryce Canyon and going though Red Rock Canyon. Just a jewel that we "happened" upon. Didn't even know that we would be going through this. There was more of the Grand Staircase along the route, too. We were heading to Glendale, Utah where my cousin Barney was hoping to meet up with us and do some touring. We had been talking about the possibility of meeting up somewhere along the journey.

9/14/10 We pulled into a KOA campground and coming around the corner from the office door was my cousin, Barney! I had told him where we would be that night and he rode his motorcycle all the way from the Los Angeles area that day- almost 700 miles. He has more of an iron butt than we do! We settled into our little cabin, he set up his tent, and I cooked us up some "Kathy helper" dinner. A one coffee pot meal of macaroni, chili and cheese. Again, a small campstore limits your menu! We visited around a little fire that night and marveled at our "meeting up" on motorcycles in Utah for a visit. We give credit to Grandpa Cranmer for introducing us to motorcycles when we were little and he taught us to ride his Honda 55.

9/15/10 Zion National Park. This park was more of a "drive by" tour. You can only get into the deep canyon by shuttle bus. There was a lot of road construction going on so it took a little more "concentration" on the driver's part! It didn't slow down the photographer though. We went through miles of massive stone formations like this monolith. There were pear cactus, trees and wildflowers dotting the sandstone, too.

More impressive Zion views. In Bryce you looked down and in Zion you looked up! It reminded me of Manhattan taking in the skyline with your eyes upward. After visiting the 5 canyons, and all the scenery in between I was glad to have pictures and the blog to clarify where we were! We keep pinching ourselves into reality and when we wake up Mark says, "Where are we today Waldo?"

Mark, Kathy and Barney finishing up the Zion tour. We saw our "stimulus money" at work today with road construction on almost every different roadway we took. I was just glad I wasn't the asphalt worker in temperatures around 100 in the desert areas.

After Zion we went into Washington, UT to the Harley shop. They were able to replace Mark's intercom cord that had broken last week. He could only hear me and for some reason didn't like the one way conversation! We traveled on Hiway 15 through a portion of Arizona and then dropped into Nevada. Nothing like 3 states in one day! We thought we'd head out towards Lake Mead on Hiway 169 and maybe look for a campsite for the night. Well, we hit more road construction, gravel, a very HOT afternoon and a dead end when it came to campgrounds. It was kind of funny because we went to Echo Bay resort area and it was basically closed down. We felt like we were in a ghost town. Barney found us a water hose and we doused ourselves and regrouped and decided to head into Las Vegas to get a hotel for the night. I think that this was one of the hottest days we've traveled and in the middle of nowhere! It was amazing to see all the washout gulches and dry rivers and try to imagine that sometimes they are flooded in this area.

Barney leading the way with his southern Californian enthusiasm and great attitude. We enjoyed every moment we got to spend with him and to "reconnect" as adult cousins. We hope to do another trip again and get Stacey in on it the next time!

Viva Las Vegas! After an internet search at Starbucks with some help from a local we found a place to stay on Sahara and rode into town with all the glittery lights! We were just glad to have a place to take a shower and lay our heads down. We left Vegas the same as it was when we got there! No shows, no gambling, just a dinner, breakfast and a bed!

9/16/10 After breakfast we traveled as far as Barstow, California together and Barney rode the rest of the way back to Tustin and we went on Old Highway 58 to 395 and up to Ridgecrest, CA (China Lake area where the Naval Weapon Testing is done). My "cold" got the best of me over the past day and we opted for a hotel, laundry and a pool. It was close to 100 degrees. We are southwest of Death Valley and glad we didn't go there like we thought we might! I have no idea why someone would want to live in these small desert towns that we went through.

9/17/10 Well, things didn't get better over the night so we booked the room for another night and I holed up in bed all day. I used the ziplock bag of pharmaceuticals I had brought and Mark went to the drug store and got a travel humidifier and more cold meds. Last night it was a makeshift vaporizer with Vicks, hot water out of the coffee pot and a towel over my head! It looks like a Walgreen's in our hotel room. Mark is feeling better but not 100% so we just decided to just take it easy. It was the first day I didn't put on boots, helmet, jeans or see the light of day! Since it was 100 degrees again that was ok. Tomorrow has to be better and we will head towards Bishop on our way to Yosemite. Mark doesn't need the intercom now since I've lost my voice! As we said at the beginning- it is going to be an adventure and some days will be better than others! Life is good when we are together.....