A Great Thanksgiving Weekend

We left for an unconventional thanksgiving on last Tuesday night. We drove to Vegas for the night and in the morning were off into the great outdoors. We first drove to Zion National Park. This was a great time and we really hit this area at the right time of year. During the summer months there are huge crowds and it is very hot, but on thanksgiving weekend there were v very few people and the temperatures were brisk. During the day the highs were about 65 and at night the temp got down to 30F or so. This is perfect camping weather.




Angels rest hike is very cool.
Great views
A sunset from out campsite. There is nothing better than camping.


Eggs and sausage in the morning is a great start to the day.



On Thursday morning we drove to Bryce Canyon National Park and it was a bit different there. (On our way we stopped off at Cedar breaks national monument and it is well worth the trip). The crowds were still non-existent, but the temperature had dropped dramatically. On the way there it seems that our water bottle leaked a little on the tent and we noticed it was wet when we began to set it up. It was so cold outside that the tent froze before we could get it all of the way up. We still were able to put it up, but the thought that it was going to dry out had vanished from our minds. We went on two hikes here and were able to see wonderful views of the Hoodoo’s and the ancient Bristlecone Pine trees. These trees can be over four thousand years old! We spent the night here and had a great big Whiteman fire to keep us warm (to no avail). We had a dusting of snow and Brenda noted that her water bottle in the tent next to her head was frozen solid in the morning. That morning we went to the visitor center (to warm up) and were off to our next destination.
High: 40F
Low: 8F

Wall Street hike through a slot canyonGreat arch in Bryce.

We went on some backroads and startled a herd of pronghorn. they began to run across the road and I knew that I could beat a few of them so the race was on. I was just about to cut them off from the rest of the herd when Brenda started to scream and thought we were driving to fast and going to hit them. We almost had pronghorn for Thanksgiving dinner.
Sunset on Bryce

Very nice sunset walk is a great way to remind us to be thankful.

On our way to Capitol Reef national Park we drove through the Escalante national monument. It is 2 million acres and to big to explore it a lifetime. There is an out of the way road into Capitol Reef that a ranger told us about so we took it. It turned out to be dirt/snow for about 40miles and very beautiful, but we only saw four other vehicles on the whole drive. These vehicles were high clearance SUV’s and trucks (not one Ford T-Bird was seen…I wonder why). We finally arrived at the visitor center after bottoming out only three times. We had not heard much about Capitol Reef, but after our visit we cannot figure out why. This is a very beautiful park that deserves to have much more recognition than it is given. There are so many beautiful aspects of this park and the pictures cannot begin to describe the beauty. We stayed the night in a national forest campground nearby. There were only 7 sites and no other campers. When we pulled up there were a few trucks out on a hill and they were having target practice with semi-autos (my kind of people). We did not see any wood so we went into town to get some. It is 6pm on a Friday night and everything was closed. I went into the only open building in town and found a three toothed woman who ran the motel/video rental store who told me that her x-husband that lived 15 miles away had firewood (thanks but no thanks woman). We passed the town she was talking about and it was not a town. Eventually we game up and found a dead tree to get wood from. Again this night was very cold and was at the limit of our new sleeping bag capabilities.
High: 45F
Low: 0F

Notice the snow. The T-Bird was not intimidated.


Arch hike above Fremont river.

Check out these petroglyphs.
Capitol Reef is a great place to visit.

The next day we drove to Great Basin National Park. It is the only National park in Nevada and it very cool. There is a great cave tour for about 1.5hrs and several great hikes that everyone should see. That night we ate at a café along Hwy50 (known as the loneliest highway in American because there are regular intervals of 70+ miles without any other roads/buildings/towns/or people). We go in and were helped by a local with…well she was a local. Soon after another young couple came it and they were obviously not from around there. The guy thought that he recognized me and asked if I was driving a red T-Bird. Of course I was and he said he recognized me from Capitol Reef where he saw me trying in vain to close the crammed trunk of my car. We invited them to our table and had a great dinner in the middle of nowhere with strangers.

That night we stayed in a hotel by Reno and drove home the next day. On the way home I saw a sign for a Cabelas that just opened in Reno. We stopped by and I had a hard time not buying everything in site.

This post is already to long so I will end it here. You must call to get all of the details.

The great cave exploration we got to take.
A "shield" is a formation and is found in very few places on earth.

Frozen alpine lake. Brenda was very scarred when it started to crack, but the ice was over 2" thick so I assured her it was ok.
You gotta love dead animals
Brenda near the fish tank