16 October 2017, Monday
Kodachrome Basin to Bryce Canyon National Park
It is cold overnight. Very cold. With jacket, warm socks and hoody, also the quilt, plus fleece blanket and one smaller blanket over our feet we manage to almost keep warm…except for mildly cold toes. We wake in the morning and O tries to take a sip from his water bottle which had been kept in the tent. It is frozen. We bravely get out from under our blankets, dress, and start Vincent up. We have decided to seek warmth and a hot breakfast in a restaurant. The nearest candidate is 14 miles away in a town with the unlikely name of Tropic. On the way, Vincent’s thermometer registers -9.5 degrees C (about 15 degrees F.)
At breakfast we realize we are only about 14 miles from Bryce Canyon National Park so off we go. Our ‘WOW’ book cautions that the entry fee to the park is high, but worth it. The fee is higher than average for a national park, $30, but we enter for free with our geezer pass. After viewing the Bryce film, we hop on the free shuttle bus and ride up to Sunset Point where we begin a figure eight loop hike, down Navaho trail through numerous well-maintained switchbacks built by the CCC. The trail passes incredible hoodoos with occasional tall trees which manage to find enough moisture to grow in the canyons and crevasses. From the end of this trail we take a connector trail to the Peek-a-boo loop, a 3 mile undulating path that winds through more spectacular hoodoos, spires and towers, passing through man-made tunnels and by natural windows along the way. This place out-Disneys Disney. Some of these formations look like they belong in a fantasy novel, or perhaps in a Dr.Seuss story.
By the end of the three mile Peek-a-boo Loop, O and I diagnose ourselves with Spectacular View Overload (SVO) also known as Hoodoo Fatigue Syndrome (HDFS.) Along the loop we photograph each other at three benchmarks to prove we have hiked the entire trail. The signs with the benchmarks promise a “small reward” if you bring proof of completion to the ranger at the Visitor Center. We are still not sure what the reward is because we get to the center after closing time.
The last part of our hike, up a narrow passageway through very tall hoodoos, is nicknamed Wall Street. This section completes the Navaho loop. O and I search for the bull along Wall Street, but we do not find it. Nor do we see Fearless Girl. Our day is capped off with a delicious bison stew at Bryce Canyon’s classic lodge built in 1929. Following dinner we return to Sunset Point for some final photos of Bryce Canyon. Then we drive back to camp to prepare for another cold night.
