Southwest National Park “Loop”

View from Above

So, armed with an almost brand-new Nikon F1 and assortment of lenses, my photographer wife, my two bright-eyed young kids, and a sense of adventure, we set off for a week of following our noses around Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and Arizona and even briefly trod on New Mexico soil at the Four Corners Monument.

First off, I’ll say my one great regret about this trip is that we never followed up with a repeat performance. This was around 1999 or so, and my kids were about 7 and 9. We had a great time! I don’t know why we as parents were so foolish as to not repeat what works, but it seems that at least my wife and I didn’t. In retrospect, I do wish I would have spent a little more time in carefree see-the-world mode and a little less time in buy-the-cool-toy-because-you-can mode. My advice to you, as sincere as I can be.

Back to our trip. We started this adventure by heading down to Bryce Canyon National Park. Back in 1999, the internet was pretty new to us, and cell phones, let alone SMART PHONES, were pretty much non-existent or only for business. So we kind of wandered about, looking for hotels and motels as we needed.  I honestly can’t remember where we stayed when we went to Bryce, but man I wish I could. There is a cool little motel just at the north end and I think maybe we stayed there, because the one thing I remember clearly from Bryce Canyon was getting up before dawn to see the sun play on the hoo doos and how fantastic it was. My memory of this is easily jogged, because shortly after we got “done” with the sunrise gazing, we took a hike out at the south end of the park to the Great Basin bristlecone pines and we fairly froze to death in our little jackets in the early morning 20 mph late March breeze! But man were those old trees cool. It really makes stop and think that a living tree that you can touch might have been alive when Christ was born or well before. For those of you, including me, who tend to generally trust what Wikipedia has to say on subjects, here is a link to a list of the world’s oldest trees http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oldest_trees . Note that the Great Basin bristlecone pine represents the top three slots almost 2,000 years older than the oldest known Sequoia! You will find both the Great Basin and Sierra Nevada well represented on Wiki’s list of worldwide mega-old trees.

The colors of Bryce in the early morning and sunset lighting are truly spectacular. The reds and yellows of the hoo doos are really something you have to see in person. The photographs of these natural wonders is stunning, but when you are there, you really almost lose your breath. Truly a moving experience and worth the trip. However, with two young kids, a hike through the formations just wasn’t going to happen on such a cold windy day. We did take a short hike, but there are some truly tantalizing hikes that I will take someday. Be mindful of the weather. You are at 8,000 to 9,000 feet here, so don’t be complacent about snow and rain. For those of you who need me to decipher…bring coats/jackets suitable for near freezing weather just in case, when the snow isn’t on the ground. When it is on the ground, get expert advice before venturing in.

After the bone-chilling March breeze of Bryce, it was a welcome feeling to visit the warm northwest entrance to Zion National Park and St. George, Utah. Into the suitcase went the 501s and out came the late 90’s version of cargo shorts…the 501 jean short and low-top hiking boots and a t-shirt. Bliss. While Bryce has you on top of the world with stunning vistas galore, Zion presents a view from a different angle. If you stick to the roads in Zion, you will get cramps in your neck from looking up at the massive red and yellow formations and the daring freaks that are climbing, resting, or sleeping on the face of those ginormous cliffs. These are not goats. They are rock-climbers in spandex, not long for this world I’m afraid. You may never see a truer-deeper shade of natural blue against the red rocks when the sun is at the right angle in Zion. Put a polarizing filter on your camera lens and drop the glare off the rocks for some colorful and contrasty shots that nearly slap you in the face. Green trees on deep red rocks with truly azure skies and maybe even a puffy white cloud complete a dazzling display of bold natural colors.

Zion is a landscape photographer’s dream, and I expect you could spend an unending number of days exploring all of the lighting and angle options and views. There are a number of very nice and easy hikes that we were able to do with our young kids and the sense of adventure is real as new vistas come into site with each elevation change. Turquoise pools, red and yellow rocks just for climbing around on, and the pretty little Virgin River for dipping your toes maybe once or twice made for something all four of us could appreciate.

One small mistake we made was assuming the North Rim of the Grand Canyon would be open at the edge of March/April. Doh! Snowed in, the signs indicated, so we had to take the long way around to Glen Canyon Dam crossing and south the very touristy South Rim. I’m sorry to say, that for me, this was a big fat annoying, YAWN. To add to the Los Angeles smog that filters in nearly constantly, we had regional fires and wind-blown dust that rendered the views quite hazy and you are so much at arms-length from this park at the South Rim. In fairness, maybe we should have planned for more time at Grand Canyon, but in honesty, I felt like I wasted the time we allotted and wouldn’t be interested in going to South Rim again…next time maybe I’d venture out on the North Rim. Maybe.

Well, we were winging it at this point, so I grabbed my DeLorme atlas and said to myself “self, why not go to Mesa Verde by way of Four Corners?” That way I was maxxing out my Gold Eagle National Park pass by chalking up another “free” entrance! Unlike my bonehead decision to go to Grand Canyon, Mesa Verde was a stroke of sheer genius (cue the angelic trumpets)! We dutifully stepped on the four corners of Colorado, Utah, Arizona, and New Mexico on our way to Cortez, Colorado where we assumed a vacancy sign was waiting. It was, and we awoke to a drizzly day, grabbed breakfast and hustled off to Mesa Verde National Park, http://www.nps.gov/meve/index.htm .

Oh my! I was awestruck so many times that day, I didn’t bother to count. The absolute ruggedness and beauty of the home of these natives was inspiring and intimidating. How on earth they came up with their cities in the cliffs is beyond me, but I can unequivocally recommend that everyone who has any sense of adventure at all make sure to put this one on the bucket list. Better yet, go see this place and avoid putting it on any list. Just do it. Two days might even be worth it, but we did get the gist of it in about a good long day, including crawling around in some of the restored dwellings the Park Service allowed. My kids really enjoyed this one a lot and were snapping pictures all over the place. By the way, a return, maybe with grandkids or maybe just my wife and I, is on my list of things that still need to be done. Absolutely an inspirational experience for me. Humans are the coolest.

By this time, my whole crew was starting to wear down on dad-the-engineer’s go, go, go vacation planning skills, so we skipped Canyonlands and Capitol Reef National Parks (still on my list), thinking we’d catch a hotel in Moab. Remember what I said about the internet and cell phones in 1999? Mistake number two was not being aware of some damn fool off-road jeep convention or something in Moab. Mind you this was 1999 and the Super 8 did have a room for $120, which was about a triple rate in those days, but I opted to head for Grand Junction/Fruita and get a reasonable hotel and a good meal. Bonus was the dinosaur museum which was a pretty big hit with the 7 and 9 year old after a late breakfast!! See, for those of you who don’t have a spontaneous bone in your body, maybe leaving the smartphone at home and winging it isn’t such a bad idea. Think about it.

Backtracking in sort of a stumbling way, a half-day tour of Arches National Park was our grand finale. Again, some really amazing rock structures that you could walk through and around on several walking tours, made for some great memories and some pretty cool photos. My kids were troopers and hung in there til the bitter end. I was quite proud. That said, I realize now on reflection that I should have stopped and smelled the roses more. One might correctly argue that was the whole point of our week-long foray into some of the National Parks in our back yard, but if I had it to do over again I would have moved slower and enjoyed time with my loved ones in a beautiful setting rather than enjoying the beautiful setting with my loved ones. There is a difference I see now. I hope my kids learn this from the old man earlier than I did. My encouragement to you is to grab that annual National Park pass and see if you can max out your enjoyment of these and other parks in any given year. Be spontaneous and have an adventure!