Nineteen degrees (-7 Celsius) is cold by most people’s measure, but that’s what greeted Brinn and me as we took our things to the car before breakfast, a car frosted over with ice. Lodging, dinner, and breakfast, were nothing of special note unless noting relative mediocrity is worthy, which I suppose with even having written this made it all noteworthy.
Looking at this overview at Sunset Point on the first steps down the Navajo Loop, it’s easy to be caught breathless by the magnitude of spectacular beauty, and yet the services surrounding this natural phenomenon are heartless utilities of banality built for people of no discernment. I do not mean to imply that I want to see 5-star luxury and Michelin-starred restaurants, but what is here is a testament to the fact that people with low expectations stay in the area. What’s missing? Reasonably priced glamping, cabins with barbecues along with a nearby grocery trading in at least a few fineries, restaurants that don’t serve the lowest common denominator foods pulled from SAD (Standard American Diet).
I looked into renting an e-bike for a half-day, and WTF? The local rental place wanted $59 for a half-day, which is only $4 cheaper than a 3-day rental up on Rügen Island in Germany, right on the Baltic Sea (the cost for a full-day rental was only $22). Also, the battery range for e-bikes in Germany (we also rented in Frankfurt) is 50 to 62 miles on a charge, while the range for e-bikes at this Bryce location is 25 to 40 miles, and the path from the shop to the park is 17 miles in one direction, so maybe you’ll have enough power for the roundtrip.
Then it dawns on me: only provide mediocre services so the nature of the place appears even more valuable compared to the ridiculous expense and horrid culinary experience had in the nearby town. Okay, enough lament; on with the beauty.
In an instant, the affront to my sense of the aesthetic is washed away like the soil that at one time must have surrounded these hoodoos. Spires, a.k.a. hoodoos, are what we came for, and now was the time to immerse ourselves in amongst them instead of just standing over their grandeur, snapping a few photos, and moving down the road.
Half of the Navajo Loop is closed for the season due to the potential for ice covering the trails on Wall Street as that part of the path is known. Well, for me this was a great deal because this meant a new trail for me. On a previous trip, Caroline and I had taken the Wall Street leg of Navajo Loop and continued on the Queens Garden Trail to Sunrise Point.
Little did I realize back on our previous hikes (I believe we’ve done this twice before, but I’m sure Caroline will have the better memory, so look for her note – Nah, I think you’re right – C.) just how different this branch of the trail would appear. It’s immediately and abundantly clear that, after more than a dozen years since our last visit, I must plan a return visit for my wife and me and stay more than a half-day so we can hike the Peek-A-Boo trail we’ve never taken.
It falls on my head as though Thor’s Hammer had struck me: because we had taken the other side of the Navajo Trail, we’d only seen this feature from above, and that other side of the trail doesn’t offer anything at all like this view. By the way, this rock feature is known as Thor’s Hammer.
Also, regarding my head, but also my center of gravity that appears to smack dab in the crack of my torso found at that southerly spot of my backside, my sense of vertigo appears to grow worse with age. The unseen photo down this canyon that is on my right, just out of sight, is a series of steep switchbacks that are triggering this fear of heights.
Then, down near the bottom of the trail, it appears that we are on nothing more than a common forest trail. Oh, while verifying a few things for this post, I saw the Fairy Land Loop Trail is the longest trail in the park at 7.8 miles and would seem to imply that I’ll have to carve out an additional day for Caroline and me if we are to include that one too. If we were to wait another dozen or more years to return to this park, I’d have just hit my 70s, and I can’t be all that certain I’d be able to knock that out. Do things while you can is my motto, all the things!
See human for scale!
And before you know it, we are on our way out. Sadly, this is not a ride at Disneyland with some people mover ready to carry us back up the 47 stories it’ll take to reach the rim again. Come to think about it; I’m happy this is not owned by Disneyland with rides where the masses could crowd this spectacle of nature with minimal effort.
Not the best photo of Brinn I’ve taken, but it’s certainly the best I’ve ever taken that includes his shadow.
By the time we were getting off the trail, all we could do was drive, drive, drive, as we were looking to get back to Phoenix earlier rather than later. Okay, we did stop for a slice of pie at that “Ho-Made” joint called Thunderbird Restaurant at Mt. Carmel Junction in southern Utah, but after lunch, we were in agreement that pie would have to wait for a future visit, which is just as well as Brinn was here with me, not the person he’s in love with and of course I wasn’t here with Caroline so his pie experience will have to wait.
Sure, we were in a hurry, but could I really skip taking any photos on the way home? Nope, and so the world’s largest dream catcher is my stand-in for representing our path back to Phoenix, which is the same route we just took yesterday on our way up.
This concludes our quick two-day jaunt covering 900 miles of sightseeing and Brinn’s first-ever visit to Utah.
