Author: Bill

It’s Wednesday morning and I am ready to climb down to the Cliff Palace and check the place out up close and personal.   Our tour was at 4 pm, so we had some time to kill,  drove in to Cortez to pick up a few things at WallyMart and find the post office to pay some taxes.   We headed back to the coach for some lunch and button up to leave the pups there while we head out for the long, windy drive to the Cliff Palace.

We arrived with about a half hour to spare and started reading about the history of the place.   As 4 o’clock approached, we headed out toward the overlook where the tour starts, listened to the spiel about how strenuous and steep the climb is, and how the high altitude can affect us.  There were about 50 of us standing out there.  Then we were off.

There were some steel stairs leading down to a locked gate where you had to hand your tickets to the ranger for admission.   Then the adventure began.

There were large rocks all around us and a narrow passage to the right with some jagged steps cut into them, very narrow steps, maybe a foot wide and all different heights, as if a blind man had carved them out of the rock.

Those steps probably went down about 120 feet.  Very cool and narrow.  Not many handholds, so the rocks filled in for that part.  The only adverse issue was the jarring shock as you stepped down and found it was closer to 18″ on some rather than 8 to 10″ steps.  

At the bottom was a narrow path that led off to the left toward the Palace.   It was a few hundred feet to the first 10′ ladder to climb.

 

After climbing that, we wound further down that path to a large nitch in the rocks where we all found spots to sit in the shade while Ranger Carol told us about the history of the people that lived here and wait for the previous tour to leave the Palace ahead.  The view of the ruins from there was terrific!   We were there at the perfect time for the sun to illuminate almost the whole Palace.    It’s really hard to imagine the people who lived here left over 800 years ago and moved south toward the Rio Grande.

After the previous tour group moved on, we descended more very uneven steps, but this time they were a lot wider.   As we moved closer to the ruins, we entered into the full sun and started to bake a bit.   Maybe 4 pm wasn’t such a great idea…  The ranger,  an archeologist by training, clued us in to how they figured out when the folks built the structures and when they left.   Apparently they only lived there about 100 years.   It is a grand structure.   The pictures don’t do it justice, you should just go there and see it for yourself.

After about 20 minutes baking in the sun standing around the actual ruins, the talks were over.   We got to look into one of the towers at some paintings on the walls, then it was time to climb out of there.   We determined it is truly harder to climb up the cliff than to go down..

There were some leisurely steps at first, then it got a lot narrower and steeper.  You have to see the crevice we climbed out of to believe it, maybe 18″ wide at spots, and three more ladders around 10′ each.  I had originally thought I wouldn’t like the ladders as they seemed to say they were on a sheer cliff with a narrow ledge, and I do not like heights.  But these ladders were in such narrow places with almost no way to see how high you were, I never even thought of how high we were.  But if anyone was claustrophobic, there would have been an issue.

Once at the top, I couldn’t believe we did it.   And Kathy, who was so cocky that morning about running laps around me, was quite a bit more subdued.   See the last picture, she could barely make it two steps from the last ladder… notice where i was taking the picture from.   [I think it was more from heat exhaustion, although the ladders climbing out were scarier than I thought they would be!]

Luckily the long walk to the car was on relatively flat ground.  And thankfully I insisted we pack some cold bottles of Snapple and fruit for after the trek.

Off to Durango tomorrow.

Our campground was just across the highway from the visitor center, so we popped in to pick up some maps and guidance for walking the pups in the park.   This is a really big park.  It’s like an hour and a half from the visitor center to the main cave dwellings.   I’ts really different from Montezuma Castle as we were above them instead of below.  This place is even cooler.  You can climb down into the structures.   They warn you about how strenuous it will be and all the ladders you must climb, etc.  Narrow two-foot-tall tunnels, etc.   I held off purchasing any tickets today as I don’t like heights.  Climbing 30 feet up a cliff face on a wooden ladder wasn’t all that appealing.

We drove to all the overlooks, the first one was the Cliff Palace and it was incredible.

i didn’t know there were about 25 different dwellings until a ranger stopped by to pet the pups and told me about them.  I knew of three prior to arriving at the park:  the Cliff Palace,  the Balcony, and the Spruce House.  But there are lots more to look at over on the Mesa Top Loop.  The best part was the pups were allowed to go on most of the trails over there and were allowed into all the buildings on that side.

Toward the end of all the loops, we came to an overlook of the Cliff Palace from the opposite side of the canyon. From my first gander at it, I could see folks climbing the cliff face ladders and they didn’t look anything like what the ranger explained.  So a bit later as we were leaving the Spruce House overlook, we stopped in the museum and purchased tickets for tomorrow at 4pm to climb down to the Cliff Palace.   It looks incredible from above.  Can’t wait to get down there!

 

We are staying in a small town called Torrey, UT.   There was even a Torrey Pines Inn just a stone’s throw away.  (not the one in La Jolla)

Really, Really Windy here!   We headed out toward the Reef on Saturday morning, hit the visitor center for a map and suggestion on where we could take the pups.   There are a  few dirt trails to drive the car a few miles into the canyons. If you go, drive down them.  It’s an awesome drive between the towering cliffs.   But don’t if it looks like any rain may come.  Those places would be a wall O water as they get very narrow near the bottoms.  And one is called the Grand Wash…  nuff said.

We started out with the trails near the river while it was still cool, and it turned out to have lots of shade trees.   There was a lot of a plant that looked like poison oak to me, so we kept the pups and ourselves clear of that.   Beautiful walk with orchards on one side and a small river on the other.  Dusty even got to see some horses up close on the neighboring property!   Visited the Gifford house on the walk back and they were selling little pies and ice cream and gifts.  It was too early in the morning for those, but it was a cool place to visit.   Lots of trees and picnic tables in the shade.

Our first stop was the Capitol Gorge at the end of the Scenic Drive.   We drove down that dirt road in Kathy’s SUV.  She was worried, but there were sedans doing it.    Basically it’s well maintained but pretty bumpy,  no washboard thankfully.   It’s very worth the harsh ride as the view is incredible.  I think it was just a couple of miles to the bottom.

On the way back I turned off on the Grand Wash dirt road.  There was a radioactive sign at the beginning. Thank god we are not planning on more kids!

It was a much shorter road but more rough than the Grand Gorge road.   More cool scenery.  I attempted to record great videos out the sunroof on both drives, but for some reason they are sideways and I am not able to correct that,  and they are too difficult to watch that way.   On the way back to Scenic Drive I was told emphatically “No more dirt roads”.

We headed out of the park after getting back to pavement, then headed east on the highway toward the petroglyph stop.  They were very cool once someone pointed out where they were.   The sign made them look 20′ tall,  they were closer to 20″ tall.   Very cool, but not as impressive as I thought they would be.

 

We came back the next morning to see the rest of the park.   Another perfect day for hiking, but today was mostly driving out to the end of the road at Rainbow Point.

We read about Fairyland Point, which is a turnoff before you get to the park entrance.   I’m glad we found the turnoff and it was another pretty vista!  Bryce is a pretty amazing park.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After Fairyland we drove over to Inspiration and Bryce Points, then we were off to Rainbow Point for a picnic lunch in the shade of a large Douglass fir.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s quite a nice drive out to the end, about 18 miles or so with lots of viewpoints along the way to stop and gawk.  I think we are all hoodoo’d out!!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On our way over to Bryce we stopped at the Red Canyon visitor center and found out the pups can walk on all the trails.   The ranger gave me a map with the two best trails marked.    As it was late in the afternoon and fairly hot we left and headed for Bryce.

The following morning we got to Red Canyon while it was still in the high 60’s, perfect for hiking the hills.   It’s a gorgeous place. The color of the rocks and the Hoodoo’s were spectacular.  We walked around one of the trails to see them up close.  Boy, the altitude really makes a difference in walking up and downhill!

 

 

 

 

 

 

We are staying just outside a small town called Hatch, UT,   the Riverside RV Ranch.   There is actually a river,  but we were told by the guy on the phone those riverfront sites didn’t have hookups.   Turns out only some of them just have water and no electricity and sewer,   but a few empty spots did have all but sewer.   Oh, well, live and learn.

We got in early in the afternoon so we set up and headed up to Panguitch to see the quilt walk.  I  had been told it was the second largest event in Garfield County, so how could we not go!  We spied lots of quilts but not many people were around to admire them.   Some pretty cool architecture in that little town.

After a quick “drive by” we headed for Bryce,  stopped by Red Canyon visitor center,  then off to Bryce Canyon National Park.

We had done some research and headed for Sunrise Point to walk with the pups over to Sunset Point.   Beautiful walk on the canyon rim.   The views are again spectacular.   It was a warm afternoon so we headed back to the RV for happy hour.   Turns out Hatch is in a dry county..  oh, well.  Good thing I found the only place that had just recently gotten a beer license!

 

It’s truly a long drive from the South Rim to the North Rim, roughly about 5 hours.   We traveled to Kanab Utah as a base camp for Zion and the North Rim,  then drove down to the North Rim from there.  It was about a 2-hour easy drive.   On the way down we saw a large fire in our path.   Turns out it was a prescribed fire and it was just to leeward of the road we were on.   I had Kathy film it on the way back so you could see it was a big area and right up to the road.  After we moved past the fire we noticed lots of what appeared to be hundreds of haystacks of pine branches and leaves.  It looked like someone had trimmed off the bottom 10-20 feet of branches on every pine tree.  I guess that is why that fire did not look like it burned any trees.  Which seemed amazing to me as pine trees go up like roman candles in the forests of San Diego.

Not far after the miles of hay stacks we came to a burned out section of forest. We were truly out in the sticks.

 

 

 

On the way probably a few miles before the park entrance, we spotted maybe 50 buffalo by the side of the road.   No fence anywhere to be seen  here, boys and girls.

 

After getting thru the entrance gate, it’s still 12 miles to the Rim.   One of our neighbors at our Kanab park had told us about a few great spots we didn’t want to miss (many thanks, Tom)  so we drove there first:   Angels Window,  Point Royal,  Point Roosevelt and Imperial Point.   We first drove to Imperial Point.  It’s at 8,800 feet, and you notice the thinner air as you walk up the steps.   It was an amazing view,  and turns out it was just a start to many amazing views that afternoon.    We kicked back with some lunch at one of the picnic tables in the shade.   BTW,  it was 20 degrees cooler at the Rim than in Kanab.

Next was Roosevelt Point,  another breathtaking view.  It’s amazing there are no crowds like the South Rim, probably due to its remoteness.   I think the scenery from the North Rim is much prettier than the South Rim.  But then again,  just my opinion.   It was a short stop and take a few pictures and head toward the main event.

Another short drive on the windy road and we were in a parking lot for Angels Window and Point Royal.    Two spectacular places,  just a short hike from the parking lot that was 3/4 empty.

Angels Window is very cool.  It’s a big rock that juts out into the canyon and has a large hole under it.   You walk over it via a narrow, maybe 36″ wide rock-way.    After Angels, I walked out to Point Royal, just another few hundred feet further on the trail.

Most amazing short hikes I have been on.   I will let the pictures show you what it looked like.