Welcome back avid readers. Firstly, a correction 😯. I have inadvertently been using the word “trek” when in fact I should have said “hike” or “walk”. The email I received from the Royal Society of Proper Trekkers was most indignant! Moving on….

Bryce Canyon was our next stop. On the way we stopped at a nondescript little local diner in a simple little town. We sat down at a booth and when I looked to my right, there was a little plaque on the wall saying “Tommy Lee Jones sat here”. How cool 🙂. In case you’re wondering, I had an omelette and Gem had chicken bacon club 🥪. We then left and quite out of the blue we passed a sign saying Butch Cassidy’s childhood home was a few miles up the road….so we went. Just a small wooden house but he left it to go on his killing and robbing spree at 18, along with his partner in crime, the Sundance Kid, so it was quite cool.

Our stay near Bryce Canyon was a place called Clear Skies. You stay in a pod (looks like a glass igloo) so that you can see the stars. They have decking, fire pits and are cleverly positioned to guarantee privacy (in case you were wondering). Sadly the weather was crap but it was great fun 🙂. We also found a local restaurant with live country music 🪕👍.

As national parks go, Bryce Canyon is relatively small, but spectacular. The rock formations are out of this world. We spent some time hiking (👍) in it and simply looking down on it. We also discovered some Bristle Cone Pines that are apparently around 1800 years old 🌲, very cool. Absolute miracle plants considering where they live!

We left Bryce and headed on towards the Grand Canyon. The first stop of note on our way were fossilised dinosaur footprints 👣. They are on Navajo land so you drive in on a dirt road to a few wooden shacks, and a Navajo man who introduced himself as Joe ( 🤔). He then proceeded to walk across the mud and stone with us (yes there are no buildings, ropes or in fact anything) and showed us fantastic footprints from Raptors and larger plant eating dinosaurs…and then the most amazing T-rex footprint. You could actually see the scales on the skin between the toes!!!!!! There was also a complete skeleton that had simply been left where it was!

Having left the amazing but ever so slightly odd dinosaur place, we went to Barringer Crater. For the uninitiated, that is one of the best, most identifiable and well known meteorite craters in the world. It was also the first one to be officially acknowledged when science decided that meteors did in fact impact the earth.

With our heads stuffed with exciting history we arrived at our Airbnb outside Grand Canyon national park. A great place to stop, wash clothes, cook a meal etc! It even has a games garage with a Pool table and old style arcade games 🚀.

After a good nights sleep we headed into the park and decided to walk the South Rim trail. We managed 18.75km, 🙂, of absolutely stunning scenery. We have seen the canyon before but it still takes your breath away. We will go back tomorrow and see if we can walk into the canyon. They had very serious flash floods about a month ago which wiped out some trails, as well as destroy the water infrastructure for the south rim!, so we will see what we can do.