Day 8: Bryce Canyon 

The rock formations of Bryce Canyon began to develop about 63 million years ago. Each year the park is visited by more than 1.5 million visitors. In winter months the park is covered with snow. We knew that, so we were prepared for all weather conditions.

We drove two miles to the park entrance and stopped at the visitor center. The road to Rainbow Point and Natural Bridged appeared to be closed because of the snow. So we decided to drive to Inspiration Point to take some photos.

 The view at Inspiration Point was really spectacular. We wanted to go into the Canyon so we decided to walk the Queens Garden trail and the Navajo trail. We drove to Sunset Point and parked the car. A lot of people were enjoying the park and the sunny weather, but not too many people took one of the trails and we could see why. It was covered with mud, since it was starting to thaw a little.
We decided to walk the trail anyway. The trail was quite slippery and we had a lot of fun walking with all that mud under our shoes. Luckily we had special hiking shoes.
We saw one spectacular rock formation after the other, and we walked down to lowest level of the park. When we got there we really needed to rest a little.

The two trails were about 3.6 miles together and it took us a few hours walking up and down.

The first part of the trail was down hill, but the second part had some steep hills. We really enjoyed ourselves although we were getting tired at the end.

 It was still early in the afternoon, when we neared the end of the trail, near Sunrise Point.
We rested for a while and walked to Sunset Point where the car was parked. We really needed a hot bath, so we decided to get back to the hotel.

What I heard about Bryce Canyon was really true. It is one of the most beautiful national parks! It is not really big, but this helps to see most interesting things in one day and relax a little in the hotel as well.
If I ever come back to this part of the States I will definitely go back to Bryce Canyon.

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