Day 18

This was a big day on my journey and I had specifically planned a chunk of my trip around being in Bryce Canyon on this day for a very specific reason. I mentioned on my last blog that Bryce is one of the premier sites for astronomers and stargazing in the entire country. The reason I wanted to be at Bryce today is there is a full moon which means great light and shadows engulf the canyon at night which should mean excellent photographic opportunities. In addition, the park rangers lead guided hikes by moonlight into the canyon on a handful of days each year and today happened to be one of those days.

However, these hikes are very popular and they limit the number of tickets available which means getting up very early and waiting outside the ranger station before they open at 8 AM. After getting up around 6:30 and throwing on a couple layers of clothes, I arrived at the ranger station about 7:15 to find about 50 people in line already... I wasn't sure how many tickets they had available but decided to wait it out and hope for the best. Eventually I reached the front of the line with the ranger still having tickets and he explained there were two hikes that night. A moonlight hike down into Bryce Canyon which was filled and a moonlight hike along the rim of the canyon which still had some tickets left. I was disappointed since the plan was the moonlight hike down into the canyon but it was better than nothing.

Fortunately, I started chatting with a few women in line who expressed the same disappointment about the hike and we decided to inquire about doing our own group hike into the canyon. We asked the Bryce Canyon rangers about the possibility and they said it was fine but encourage us to scout the trail in the daylight before doing it at night. So we made plans to all scout the trail this afternoon individually and met back up at 8:15 to embark on a moonlight adventure in the depths of Bryce Canyon surrounded by the Hoodoos.

I had about 12 hours to kill between the moonlight hike so decided to split my day into two sections. First, I decided to spent the day viewing Bryce Canyon from the rim and multiple viewpoints that are all available either at or a very short walk from the road. All of these view points were from up above the canyon and looking down at the Hoodoos and other geological features of the canyon. Some pictures from this morning are below:

Paria View

Inspiration Point and the hundreds of Hoodoos all over Bryce Amphitheater

Natural bridge, which is not really a bridge and instead an arch; meaning it has been carved by weather over time and not rushing water like most arches.

After hitting the major viewpoints along the canyon rim, I spent the afternoon hiking down in the canyon to scout for the moonlight hike later that night. Since the path for our hike tonight was not set I decided to hike the three major trails in the canyon including Queens Garden, Navajo Loop, and Peekaboo Loop. Combined these were just under 10 miles with more elevation change than I expected and just made it back before the moonlight hike was to start. On the plus side, the perspective of the Hoodoos down in canyon was dramatically different and had some cool photographic opportunities. A few sample pictures are below:

After getting completing my “scout” hike and a very quick snack for dinner; I met up with the ladies from this morning for our moonlight hike into the canyon. We waited until well past the moon rise to ensure we had sufficient light to start the hike. We hoped to not use any artificial light so enough moonlight was crucial... Some pictures from that evening are below:

After the midnight hike, I had to start a long drive to Page, Arizona for the next day of my trip... Quick dose of caffeine and the drive was on! Since the drive bled over into Day 19 the story will continue on my next blog update. Thanks for reading my blog and as always any questions / comments please post below or email me at chris@pricelessperspectives.com