The Kirks

We drove out of Las Vegas on I15 and eventually turned onto Highway 89 (of which more later) towards the Grand Canyon North Rim (much less visited than the South Rim). As you drive up from the desert, the landscape gradually changes to an alpine meadow and ponderosa pine forest and even as you get very close to the canyon, there’s no indication in the landscape of what is about to unfold. We stayed at the Grand Canyon Lodge which is the only place to stay in the park and it was definitely worth it. The standard of the accommodation and food was pretty bad but the view was superb. It’s difficult to capture it all in a photograph and the sheer scale of the canyon is remarkable. This is the view out of the dining room window!

There are lots of other good photographs on this site but none of them really do it justice. We did a mule trek down into the canyon which was very steep in places and was slightly worrying for Isabelle and I who don’t ride. Being below the rim gave us a very different viewpoint on the canyon.

We moved on after two days to Zion National Park. Once again, it was on Highway 89 until we turned off onto Highway 9. This road must be one of the most beautiful in the USA. After driving through a weird set of sandstone mesas (each of which is as impressive as Uluru) you go through a 3 mile tunnel and come out onto the most astonishing sandstone canyon; 3000 ft cliffs dropping vertically into the river and massive peaks of all sorts of different colours. Here more than anywhere else, the effects of foreshortening make the photographs much less impressive than the real thing.

There are also some good photographs here. One of the startling things about the USA is that we had never heard of either this park or of Bryce (see later) until Jen Wheary told us to come here but it’s absolutely stunning. In any other country it would be a wonder of the world. Once again, we stayed in the national park accommodation and this time, both the rooms and the food were excellent. Altough they’re all run by the same company the standard varies considerably. We did a long hot trail up to the Upper Emerald pools and then took the bus up to the head of the canyon. Zion is different from the other parks we went to in that private cars are not allowed so all transport is by a very efficient propane fueld bus service. It makes it a lot more relaxing and pleasant. The walk up to The Narrows was beautiful.

The following day, it was up early to go to Bryce Canyon. Once again, along Highway 89 (which will feature in later blogs…) through scenery which was beautiful in its own right. Bryce is a bit more…commercial? The national park lodge is definitely the right place to stay and the food and accommodation were fairly good. Bryce isn’t really a “canyon” since there isn’t an other side to it. It’s just a very weirdly eroded “edge”. The sandstones and limestones weather due to freeze-thaw fracturing into ridges and then “hoodoos“. It’s quite extraordinary.

(There’s another geekily good photograph of Bryce here). We walked down the Navaho trail and Queen’s Garden trail into the canyon where you walk between sheer walls of hoodoos some of which are topped by natural bonsai pine trees. It’s hot and dusty and a great experience.

Yesterday we continued up Scenic Highway 89 for as long as we could enjoying the experience of being on the highways. There will be a forthcoming blog on “Driving in the USA” but it’s enough to say that it’s a fabulous way to travel. Unfortunately we had to get on Interstate 15 to go through Salt Lake City which appeared to be a fairly unpleasant city with too much industry and bad housing. Leaving the Interstate, we rejoined H89 and spent the night in Logan, UT. Then it was up Logan Canyon, past Bear Lake and the Star Valley before hitting Wyoming and getting to Jackson tonight.

We’ve been through 6 states (California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Idaho and Wyoming) and seen extraordinary scenery. People from America often go on about how beautiful their country is but to be honest, they’re probably underselling the beauty of the continent. With all respect to our Australian friends, things like Kings Canyon, Uluru or the Olgas can’t compete. You could drop Uluru into Zion Canyon and not even notice it. Some of our fellow travellers do sometimes cause a misanthropic rant but this can’t detract from the grandeur, scale and sheer power of the landscapes that we’ve seen from the Mohave Desert to the Rockies of Wyoming.

We’re in Jackson at the moment in the Teton National Park and will go up to Jellystone…sorry Yellowstone in a couple of days. More blogs from there.

p.s. Our trip up from Las Vegas was suggested by Jen Wheary who told us to stay on the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and also to go and see Zion and Bryce neither of which we would have known about. She also rightly strongly recommended staying in the national parks. Thanks Jen.