Trip #2: Mountain Rd Trip Day 5,Bryce Canyon, UT to Grand Canyon NP, AZ

Day of Post: 08-04-2019
Day of Event: 6-12-2019

Mountain Southwest Road Trip 2019 Day 5

Highlights of this day included:
1. Wake up at Bryce Up Top Lodge (showers!! not really, hot water heater broke)
2. Drive through Red Canyon
3. The beautiful Zion National Park (Compromised by extensive road construction, facility closures, and missing signage.)
4. Long meandering trip from South Exit of Zion to Colorado City, AZ to Pipespring to Vermilion Cliffs to Marble Canyon to Grand Canyon.
5. Pipespring National Monument
6. Vermilion Cliffs National Monument
7. Marble Canyon and Bridge
8. Grand Canyon!!!
9. Campsite at Grand Canyon!!

So....let's get to some pictures...

Departed Up Top Lodge outside Bryce Canyon, en route to Zion.  Ran into this beautiful canyon on the way.

Red Canyon, UT

Samuel got to drive through this. Red Canyon, UT.

Red Canyon, UT

Red Canyon, UT

Checkerboard Mesa: Zion NP, UT

Shorter tunnel, East Entrance, Zion NP, UT

Entered beautiful valley; hard to get good picture angle; Zion NP, UT

Zion NP, UT. Beautiful.

Zion NP, UT. Picture does not truly capture this magnificent canyon.

Construction - everywhere. Zion NP, UT.

I'm sure this was a combination of summer busyness and construction, but our time at Zion National Park was short on adventure, long on sitting in a car and long on missed turns due to missing signage.  There wasn't a word of it on the NPS site for Zion....so no real way to plan and adjust.  We experienced just enough of it to wish to go back, perhaps in the off season, or perhaps camping in there or arriving at 4:30am.  The two must frustrating parts of our time in Zion were: 1. the one way traffic permitted due to the construction.  At 9:30am, 99% of the people are coming IN, not leaving, so why do they set up the one way stop lights to permit equal time passages for traffic??  There were numerous 5 minute segments of no traffic coming or going.  And 2. Avoid the Watchman trail.  It's very poorly marked, no shade, a lot of effort for a minor vista.  Also for first timers, you have to ride a shuttle bus everywhere in the park, and parking at the visitor's center fills up fast.

Goodbye Zion NP.  Beautiful spot.  Wish I could have enjoyed it.

Next planned major stop: Grand Canyon National Park, AZ.  Obviously due to geography, the W-E space occupancy of the canyon limits N-S cut across traffic.  Though that is clearly obvious on maps, it is a very realistic challenge when hoping to get to the south rim from Zion NP.  It was a lengthy, yet beautiful drive, and you need to set aside 5-6 hrs to get there from the Zion South entrance.  As the crow flies, it's barely 90 miles from Zion South to Grand Canyon Village at the South Rim.

Pipespring National Monument.  Nice little stop if you have NPS Access Pass.  Otherwise, would not recommend spending $10 a person to get in to see a spring and an old building. 

Pipespring NM, AZ. Corrals.

Pipespring NM, AZ.  The spring that supplied the area.

Pipespring NM, AZ.  The main attraction, but you don't get access unless you wait for one of the ranger tours once on the hour.

Vermilion Cliffs NM, AZ

Vermilion Cliffs NM, AZ.

Marble Canyon. AZ.  That's the Colorado River with rafts at a low flow low speed section.

Marble Canyon AZ.  New bridge.  Pretty.  Bridge is over the Colorado River.

Grand Canyon!  We've arrived. East entrance. South rim.

Grand Canyon NP, AZ.

I've forgotten some of the lookout point names, but this and the following pictures are south rim with lookout and pullout points progressing from East to West.  The beauty and configuration of the canyon changes at every point, and I'm amazed that we only saw about 5% of it.

Grand Canyon NP AZ.  Looks like I'm repping for Ahrberg Milling Company. 

Grand Canyon NP, AZ. South rim. Haze from a nearby grass fire.

Grand Canyon NP, AZ.  South rim.

Grand Canyon NP, AZ.  South rim.

 

Grand Canyon NP, AZ.  South rim. Sunset.

Grand Canyon NP, AZ.  South rim.

Grand Canyon NP, AZ.  South rim.  Just an elk cow on the drive in to our campsite. 

We were nearly never fully planned where we were to stay every night.  Fortunately, anywhere in the mountain west, one is never more than about a 20 mile drive from any of the following: National Park Service park camping; Bureau of Land Management campsite; or National Forest Service campsites.  In the summer, the more popular NPS campsites fill up, sometimes months or years in advance.  We tried to get a site in Grand Canyon in the days before but were told no.  We showed up at sunset asking if there were cancellations, and they had 6 cancellations, so we got a campsite right inside Grand Canyon National Park, which permitted us additional time to explore the next morning.