Moab to Capital Reef Park and Bryce Canyon

Another early start today, on the road at 7:30. Once again it's wide open places with not a sign of life in sight as we drive across the San Rafael dessert. Just had a stop at a small 'village', Hanksville. Our tour guide had phoned ahead so when we walked in the coffee pots were ready to pour. What service. 

This is the Main Street and as you can see there's not a lot here. 

This is where the real Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid used to hang out in the 1850s because it is so remote. 

There wasn't any one thing in Capital Reef Park that was amazing, but all we drove through was beautiful. 

The next one is supposed to represent the dome of the Capitol Building in Washington DC.

Next stop was to see some petroglyphs which had been etched into the rock by the Fremont Culture people sometime between 700 and 1250. 

It was very difficult to photograph the goat and as you can see it wasn't quite perfect. Pity some morons had decided to add their own graffiti in 1911 and 1945. Some things never change. 

Soon it was time for lunch and we stopped in a very pretty spot. 

The next shot doesn't seem to be very American to me. 

During our drive today we reached a height of 9600 ft and this was the view from the coach as we were speeding through. 

Eventually we arrived at Bryce Canyon and words can't begin to describe it. The size and the beauty of what nature has produced just blows you away. Hopefully the photos will give you a taste of what we saw. 

At the end of a brilliant day a small group of us decided to descend to sunset point, a 20 minute steep descent and 40 minutes to huff and puff back up. 

Here we are on our way.

A victory photo.

We arrived at our hotel at 6:15 but no time to rest, a quick wash and change and back out at 6:40 to go to a Cowboy Night. The food was what you'd expect, chicken, pork, beans and potatoes, washed down with lots of diet coke, or in his case, beer. 

The 'cowboys' were brilliant and sang and entertained us with their rope skills, gun twirling and whip cracking. 

Me with the gun twirler and Hazel, a travelling companion.