October 7-19, 2007 - From Goblin
Valley we took the gorgeous scenic
byway along Route 12 through Torrey,
Capitol Reef National Park, and
Escalante to Kodachrome Basin State
Park. Like all the Utah state park
campgrounds, this one was lovely.
There was a flock of chukars (birds closely related to the quail) that
wandered about the grounds happily taking food from my hand.
We hiked the Panorama Point
View trail, soaking in the immense
redrock formations. Several had
cute names, including Ballerina Leg, which truly
looked like a ballerina's leg.
Sandstone is very soft, and we found a huge sandstone rock that other visitors had rubbed. It was fun to put your hand in the
handprint in the rock and rub. The rock would granulate into sand beneath your fingertips.
From Kodachrome Basin we headed over to Zion National Park.
Because we were towing the trailer and we were 52 feet from end to
end, we opted to approach the park from the west side rather than
taking the really cool twisting road in from the east. So we didn't see
the amazing rock formations that flank the roads on the eastern side.
However, once we arrived at Zion we took an exquisite bike ride
along the bike path that leads into the park. The road into the
main canyon is closed to motorized vehicles, and we thrilled to the
mammoth cliffs on either side of us as we rode deep into the
canyon.
There was an organized bike
ride going through Zion a few
days after we did our bike
ride. It would be fun to be
part of a large crowd of
cyclists taking over this pretty
road through the park, but we
enjoyed the solitude of riding
by ourselves beneath the
towering spires. We had a
perfect day with warm
temperatures, clear blue skies
and lots of flowers in bloom.
We were continuing to press
on southwards, barely staying
ahead of the winter weather
behind us. At Snow Canyon
State Park we found another
delightful campground where
we tucked ourselves right up
against the redrocks. We rode
our bikes on the beautiful park
road and looped through some
pretty new masterplanned
neighborhoods on the outskirts
of St. George.
At last it was time to leave Utah. We decided we would return
in the Spring of 2008, as we had barely touched upon the areas we wanted to see. In the meantime, however, the cold was
forcing us out, and we drove south to the outskirts of Las Vegas, Nevada, where we found the spectacular Valley of Fire State
Park.