Bryce Canyon...squirrels and fossils and chipmunks; oh my!

Ruby's near Bryce Canyon...check out that petrified tree stump...it can be yours for a mere $8500.00 :)

Is it a chipmunk or a squirrel?

What is your guess?

Check out those roots! They've evolved to survive erosion!

Looks like a backdrop doesn't it?! Nope, its the real thing...Bryce Canyon

***The answer....a squirrel...it doesn't have the white stripes across its face too.

Bryce Canyon...tons of Hoodoos watching you!
















Caylin taking a break after a long day hiking at Bryce Canyon
















The OMG don't breath hiking trail above Bryce Canyon....the trail gets narrower and the rails smaller :}

































More of the OMG-hold your breath trail as the trail narrows

Bryce Canyon-Hoodoos and twisted tree















Looks like a chipmunk....but, it is a squirrel. Chipmunks have the white stripes on their bodies and heads.














Caylin and Aaron resting after the Moss cave and waterfall hike.














Aaron's picture of hoodoos from Bryce Canyon on the Mossey trail.

Where did you go today?

HooDoos

Coming down Mossey trail













Mossey Waterfall in sandstone. Bryce Canyon, Utah.














The view from Mossey Trail of sandstone formations (hoodoos) in Bryce Canyon














Dejavu



















What have you seen today?

close-ups

The trail leading to Mossey cave and waterfall is very scenic and well worth the hike















Randy admiring the cave














Aaron looking down into the cave














The hand dug river created by pioneers over 100 years ago.














Aaron, Caylin and Randy wondering down the Mossey Cave trail....caution...snake ahead

Where have you been today?

Watch out for that snake!!!!!!!! Mammoth Lizards

This trail is lableled as a moderately strenuous, ocassionaly strenuous 1 mile trail that leads to a waterfall and a cave in Bryce Canyon National Park. The hike was fun, but watch out for snakes crossing the path. Rattlesnakes are common in this area, thankfully the snake that crossed within inches of our feet was a nonvenomous garter!















Caylin posing with a sculpture of a horned lizard (commonly called a horney toad in Texas). Different varities horned lizards can be seen throughout the four corner states. We saw so many, we lost count.














Fauna again! Another common reptile in the four corner states is the Great Basin Collard Lizard.














Aaron and Caylin posing in front of a giant Great Basin Collard Lizard at a BLM office near Escalante, Utah! I don't think Aaron is an impressed as Caylin.

OMG!!!!!!

Scenic Highway 12. Very beautiful road and recipient of a prestigious award n1 (stay tuned to future blogditions to find out which)















Beauty becomes lethal. This is where the one lane road becomes two lanes. The drop-off is about 300 feet down and there are no guard rails on either side of the road! They wouldn't even be able to tell that there was a vehicle of any type down there if you rolled off...it would just look like a hunk of metal. I don't even think they could recover you or your vehicle from the bottom!!! This is where I start to feel nauseated and ?Randy's palms start to sweat.














It is all that I can do to roll down the window, hold my hand out with the camera strapped to my wrist and start snapping pictures without looking.














OMG! Aaron starts making comments about falling off the road and hitting bottom. My checks are flushed and I think I am going to have to lean out of the window...I am that nauseated.














Previously in the trip Aaron asked what was the maximum slope our RV pulling little H could handle....Randy says 10%.



OMG this is 14% and there is no where to turn our rig around! Remember a grade of 8% heated up our breaks enough to where we could smell them and ended up pulling over for a bit to let them cool.

Mooove

Love the flora! The Aspens are beautiful!

Watch out for slow moving cattle on the top of the mountain! We tried to get them to "moooove" :) a little faster but they were on their on schedule!

Peek-a-boo

Scenic Highway 12....the road to remember. Notice the elevation. The temperature changed about 20 degrees when we reached the top. But, the best was yet to come....if we only knew!















At this elevation you can see many aspens and pines.














The aspens are also called flicker trees. They have white bark and their coin sized and shaped leaves flicker and flutter with the wind.














You have to love the sharp, inclines, and high elevations with no guard rails anywhere!
It makes you wonder how many people have flown off the road and down into the canyons.














Finally, after reaching an elevation around 7500 feet it is time to descend. This is nothing compared to what lies on the other side of Boulder, Utah on this road. The sharpest grade was an 8%. Aaron asks Randy what grade we would have to turn back and go the other way for in our RV pulling little H....his response, 10%



We get to the bottom and can smell the brakes! What a warm fuzzy feeling that gives us all! Although the scenery quickly makes up for what the road dished out at this point!

What have you seen outside of your windshield today?











Fruita deer are very friendly! Don't feed them though!















Historic house and muesum in Fruita.

















Fauna of Fruita!










Flora! Cotton Wood! The trees are amazing and extremely old in Fruita. I wonder what this tree would say if it could talk?!?

Fruita-Fruits everywhere! The visitors center explains that the petroglyphs are drawings of aliens :)

Capital Reef National Park Fauna in the area they refer to as Fruita. They have hundreds of fruit trees planted in this area and visitors are allowed to pick and taste the fruit. The trees were originally planted in the late to early 1800s-1900s.















Aaron and Caylin playing on one portion of a vine in Fruita, Capital Reef. In the museum they tell of a dentist that was passing through Fruita. He loved the landscape and the climate in this area so much that he never went back home. It is tempting I must stay! But, we would miss our friends and family too much we'd rather endure 103 degree temperatures during the summer!














Some of the fruit trees in Fruita.














Here are the aliens again :)














Their body language says we are so sweet and innocent! Boy, can we call their bluff or what!