Bryce Canyon National Park - part 2
June 15, 2011

The hike we selected was the Navajo Loop - Queen's Garden combination. We hiked from the Sunset Point on the rim down the Navajo Loop to the bottom of the canyon, and then cam back up the Queen's Garden trail to Sunrise Point on the rim. It was then a half-mile hike along the rim to get back to Sunset Point and complete the loop. The National Park Service advertises this as the "World's Best 3-Mile Hike".









Alex and Zack are leading the way down into Wall Street from Sunset Point. Zack has his new hiking stick.










The trail leads into this very narrow canyon with vertical walls; it was really neat!













Surprisingly, trees grow from the bottom of the canyon to reach the light.









All the pine needles are way up there where the tree gets sunlight.








Zack and Alex (clowning around again) with their grandmother on the trail at the bottom of the canyon.









The Queen's Garden area. Somewhere in there is the Queen's throne, but we are not sure which rock formation that is.








The Park Service cut tunnels in some of the rock walls to make the trail easier to hike. Without the tunnels, we would still be in there climbing over rocks to get to the end of the trail. Thank you, Park Service.








Looking back on some of the terrain we hiked through. If it weren't for marked trails and trail signs, one could get lost in there!

One the way up to Sunrise Point on the rim, the boys said they were too tired to hike the segment along the rim back to Sunset Point. Instead they stubbornly headed for the bus stop to take the shuttle bus from Sunrise Point to the campground. However, they walked in the wrong direction and wound up at the shuttle bus stop at Sunset Point! So they completed the "World's Best Three-mile Hike" after all, without knowing it, and despite their refusal to do so!








Bryce Canyon is home to several herds of pronghorn, otherwise called antelope. They are the fastest land animals in North America. We were told that the adults can run a sustained 40 MPH, and that newborn pronghorn can run 25 MPH one hour after birth. Yesterday we saw a couple of young pronghorn that the bus driver said were about two weeks old. The seemed to be running very fast, and continuously, while their parents grazed. However, I couldn't photograph them since we were in the shuttle bus at the time, and the bus driver didn't stop the bus.








One of the pronghorn crossing the road. With those thin legs, they look like elegant balllet dancers.

Tomorrow we head for Grand Teton National Park.