Before I start I would recommend that you get something to drink, a snack, or go to the bathroom if you need to go because this post is going to be LONG! :)
Our trip out west was absolutely amazing and we crammed just about everything we could into it! For those of you who don't know, I went with 2 of my friends from Penn State (Margaret-maid of honor at wedding, and Abby). We all flew into Phoenix Monday morning. We rented a car and headed northwest from Phoenix to Lake Powell. We drove the majority of the day, stopping along the way at this little native american trading post/restaurant for some awesome indian fry bread topped with roast beef for dinner (think southwest version of hot roast beef sandwich). This place we stopped at was in a "town" that consisted of a trading post & restaurant across the street from some other building....and that was it. The rest of the "town" was just dessert & mountains, no other buildings. The scenary along the drive was gorgeous. We finally made it to Lake Powell sometime right before sunset (we weren't really sure what time it actually was....we kept getting confused because AZ doesn't observe Daylight Savings Time but the indian reservations in AZ do so at any given point we were either an hour ahead or behind of what we thought :) So anyways we are driving through Page, AZ (a little bit bigger town-it had a Pizza Hut and like 5 hotels) and trying to find our campground for like an hour. Our mapquest directions kept leading us away from the Lake but Mags said our campground was at the actual Lake. We finally asked for directions and they pointed us over this bridge/dam to Glen Canyon Nat'l Park a few minutes away (right by the lake). This wasn't on the mapquest directions but at this point the sun had already set and we'd all been awake since 5 am so we didn't care. We drove up to the site and the guy at the registration for the campsite was locking up when Mags ran out of the car for us to check in and get to our campsite. He said her name wasn't on the list of late registrants but we could just pick a site (they had a lot open) and come in and pay him in the AM. So we set up our tent with the help of the car headlights and fell asleep. Needless to say we woke up at the crack of dawn the next morning (literally) and watched the sunrise over Lake Powell (amazing).
Sunrise over Lake Powell.
We tore down camp and repacked the car to head into Page for our 7:30 reservation to see Antelope Canyon. Well, remember how I said indian reservations didn't observe daylight savings time? Apparently Lake Powell is on an indian reservation so when we thought it was 7:15 it was really 6:15. Also, the camp didn't open until 8 am and by that point we would be long gone in the middle of Antelope Canyon. So yeah, big whoops on our part, we stole a camping night from the National Parks! Shhh, dont' tell anyone ;) So we drove around and took some pictures of the Lake until it was 7:30 and time for our Antelope Canyon tour. We all loaded in this suburban and they started driving us out to the canyon for our tour. We were driving away from the Lake, toward the canyon, and on the way there, Mags noticed a campground called "Page Lake Powell Campground." Apparently that was the camp ground we were supposed to stay at but we couldn't find it the night before! It was no where near the lake! (VERY deceiving name!) Oh well, honest mistake! So by accident we ended up camping at this amazing site right on Lake Powell for free.
OK, so then we went to Antelope Canyon which was absolutely amazing! This canyon had been formed from flash floods and water and is over 150 million years old. We walked through the canyon (about 1/4 mile each way) and took some AMAZING pictures! Our tourguide was really good at helping us get good shots. She also told us that with each flash flood, the floor of the canyon can rise or lower an average of 5 feet. That's pretty amazing. I just hope it never fills up all the way because this canyon is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. I'm hoping to get one of my pics blown up and framed.
Antelope Canyon
So after Antelope Canyon our next stop was Bryce Canyon in Utah. We realized in the wee hours of Tuesday morning that the time change between AZ and Utah was going to mess us up again and we had 3 hours from the end of our Antelope Canyon tour until our horseback riding tour in Bryce Canyon. Luckily the drive was only supposed to take 2 hours and 45 minutes! We ran into a teeny bit of construction (the only "traffic" we hit the entire time) and ended up being a little late to our tour but called ahead and they waited for us. They were pretty laid back in Utah. So I've never ridden a horse before, let alone for 4 hours up and down a mountain and on the edge of a canyon! My horse's name was J.D. short for Jack Daniels (how appropriate for me......all the other horses had typical horse names like "Lucky" or "Stormy"...haha). We rode up the mountain and stopped at the top of one of the canyons for about 30 minutes. It was amazing. Our two tourguides were "cowboys" and also did rodeos. The one guy was telling us all about staying on the horse/bull for the first 10 seconds and how much money you can make, and also about how many times he's been injured and how when he frequently needs to be intubated if he falls off the horse and lands on his back (ummmm, that's not something I would brag about buddy!) And on the way back down the canyon (well, technically we were still on the top of the canyon...very close to the edge) we had to stop because the tourguide in the front on his horse saw a baby rattlesnake and apparently horses are afraid of rattlesnakes. Luckily the thing slithered away and no one's horse freaked out and fell off the mountain ;)
Bryce Canyon view from my horse!
So that evening we stayed at this awesome campground/hotel/travel stop called Ruby's (I highly recommend if you ever go to Bryce Canyon)! We stayed in a tipee!! It was awesome!!! They also had an outdoor pool and hot tub. The hot tub felt amazing after spending 4 hours riding a horse! And the weather was starting to get a little cool so it was super relaxing sitting in the hot tub for a little bit. It got pretty chilly in the tipee that night! Luckily I had my super warm sleeping bag so I was nice and cozy all night. I'm not sure how cold it got but that morning we woke up and it was sleeting and there was SNOW on our tipee door!!!!!!! (Only a tiny bit but still! The tipee was not any warmer than our tent the night before!) So anyways we were up so we decided to go see the sunrise over Bryce Canyon. We didn't actually see the sun
rise
because of all of the clouds/snow/sleet but there was a gap in between some of the clouds so it cast some pretty cool light onto the canyon and the canyon itself was AMAZING! We drove up to a couple scenic views to take some pictures and then decided to get some breakfast. Luckily, it didn't snow/sleet/rain while we were at the canyon but on our way to breakfast it started HAILING! Crazy!
Bryce Canyon Sunrise
We had originally planned to head straight to the Grand Canyon from Bryce but had heard from numerous people how amazing Zion National Park was and found out we really weren't that far from it. So since it was 7:30 AM and we had already seen Bryce, we decided to head further southwest to Zion. This was the most breathtaking place I've ever seen in my life! I seriously almost cried it was so unbelievable. I was so overcome with emotion at how astonishing Zion was! We were able to drive deep into Zion before they didn't let you drive anymore. We were COMPLETELY surrounded by the absolutely gigantic mountains and we even drove through one! The winding road led us down through these mountains/canyons until we go to the visitor center. From there we rode up through some of the park on a shuttle and went for this really great hike. I could have spend DAYS at this place! I think we stopped at almost every single pullover place you could pullover to take pictures!
Checkered Mountain at Zion
Can you see me?!?!?!
After Zion we headed south again toward the Grand Canyon. We took the "alternate" route which also happened to be the "scenic" route and this was the best drive I've ever been on in my life! (I hate driving/traveling in cars). We saw absolutely amazing rock formations/mountains and you just couldn't stop staring at them for miles and miles!
We finally made it to the Grand Canyon about an hour before the sun was supposed to set! We ended up stopping at a bunch of the drive up points to get pics and just made it to the final drive up point literally 3 minutes before the sun set! But we made it!! And it was amazing! I can't believe we were able to watch the sun rise over Bryce Canyon in the freezing cold, hike through Zion National Park with perfectly clear blue skies, and then watch the sun set over the Grand Canyon.....ALL IN ONE DAY!!!!!!!!!!!! Next to my wedding (our anniversary is Sunday btw, YAY!), this was definitely one of the most amazing days of my life!
We made it!!
View before sunset
Sunset over the Grand Canyon
Thursday morning we got up early (again!) and drove up to the grand canyon and took the shuttle tour up to Hermit's Rest stopping along the way to take lots and lots of pictures.
Then we headed south to a small town called Williams, AZ which historic Route 66 runs through. It was really cute, we had lunch there at a little mexican restaurant and sat outside...the weather was perfect! We continued to head south to Prescott, AZ and stopped in for a beer at the Prescott Brewing Company. Then we put the pedal to the metal to make it back to Phoenix in time to drop me off for my 6:00 flight back to Bham!
This is I think my longest blog EVER but our trip was so awesome I wanted to include everything in it! I'll have my pictures posted on webshots soon! I promise! I'll let you know when they're up!
