Panguitch, UT and Bryce Canyon National Park

Bryce, a set on Flickr.

The road between Zion National Park and Bryce Canyon National Park does not exactly bring one in close proximity with any large, or even mid-sized cities. This led us to Panguitch, UT. We managed to stock up on the essentials- progresso soup, coffee, milk, box mac and cheese, baby carrots, celery, Johnsonville brats and tootsie rolls at the local grocery. We even found some cards to send for Mother's Day. The selection didn't actually include Mother's Day cards, but H found a nice one with a picture of bison and I found a glittery one with butterflies. Perfect. If you haven't ever been to Utah, you should be aware that beer sold in grocery stores is 4% ABV, regardless of brand or variety. It's near beer. Don't buy it. Go to a state sponsored liquor store and spend your money on actual beer. We did. On our way out of the liquor store, newly supplied with tasty Utah microbrews, we ran into an adorable little blond girl with a box of rocks. She asked us if we would like to see them, and obviously we did. Her favorite was a a big pinkish piece of quartz. I'm guessing there isn't a lot to do in Panguitch but she was adorable. She reminded me of the stories of my brother Matt selling rocks and bouquets of Queen Anne's lace to the sweet old couple that lived across the street from us when I was little.

We rolled into Bryce just after sunset and set up camp. Bryce sits at over 8000 feet above sea level- that means when the sun goes down in May, it gets cold. We slept in down bags, wearing down jackets, with a down comforter on top of our thermarests and our hats on all night. Brrr. The next day we took a very cool 3 mile loop hike into the canyon- Sunrise Point down to Queen's Garden up the Navajo Loop and out via Sunset point. Bryce is probably best known for it's hoodoos. Hoodoos are these crazy, eroded, rock formations that look like giant sandcastles that got rained on. Check out the photos. After our little hike, it was time to boil some brats in beer on the jet boil (kind of a foamy disaster) and finish them off over the fire. Delicious.

-SJK